I totally enjoyed this movie more than I thought I would. I think I went in with low expectations because it took three years to be released in Australia - but it was a completely watchable film. Maybe I would've been annoyed had I seen it in the cinema but on TV it plays fine.
Woody Allen movie these days offer pleasures I never thought they would - attractive settings, all star casts lovingly photographed, plenty of stories. You don't normally think of Allen as a great story teller, mostly because he re-uses so many of the same characters and situations, but there's plenty of plot, each scene pushes the action forward, the characters are relatable, the all star cast means it's easy to follow what's going on.
Anthony Hopkins dumps Gemma Jones to chase Lucy Punch who wants Theo James while Jones winds up with Roger Ashton-Griffiths; their child Naomi Watts is married to Josh Brolin who wants Freida Pinto who is engaged to Neil Jackson, while Watts wants Antonio Banderas who is married and has a fling with Anna Friel. Everyone is pretty much unrequited except Jones to takes the blue pill Matrix style, buying into reincarnation and being happy as a result.
The Allen tropes are on display yet again: older man with younger woman (I genuinely feel he's biologically incapable of writing a film featuring this); frustrated artist; person breaking into someone's house; prostitute; class class relationship; affairs and the middle classes; sexual obsession. It's nice to see a non white family in the form of Pinto and her parents. Some of the dialogue is clunky.
You kind of feel Allen mostly made it so he made a film that year but it's attractive and well acted and I did enjoy it.
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