Woody Allen ran out of ideas a while ago - this has novelty in that it's in French but the ingredients are the same: chattering classes, nice restaurants and houses, some narrative. A married person has an affair (here a woman), murder results (here the husband of the woman who is jealous), guilt results.
The actors are fine, I guess - Lou de Laage is very pretty though seems not that interested in what is going on, whether it's having an affair, the guy going missing or wondering if her husband is a killer. The character of her mother feels undercooked, potential robbed.
Woody just should have made the film about a man persecuted by his daughter, son and ex wife, you sense that's the film he really wanted to make.
John Farrow is a fascinating, under appreciated director and character in Hollywood history. He deserves a really strong book. This isn't quite there though it's got some good stuff. It also has a lot of waffle and psychology. I was hoping for more research, such as analysis of Farrow's writings (of which there were a lot eg his book on the popes and Damien the Leper). Being fair, there's some research, I wanted more of it and less psychology. Maureen O'Sullivan and Mia Farrow get decent airings as well.
Big tome. Like all McGilligan books it's very thorough, goes into detail on it's subjects ancestors, possibly wastes too much time going on about critics and critical reputation. Goes through the allegations with admirable thoroughness which also makes the book really depressing to read. Not McGilligan's fault. He tries to be objective but his sympathies are with Allen, invoking the blacklist, Allen's donations to progressive causes, invoking The Bad Seed and The Children's Hour as well as the Scottsboro Boys and the McMartin case (like, seriously?) without seemingly having done too much research into reports of sexual abuse or empathy as to why women especially got so upset. We are all prisoners of our age, race, gender and class I guess. Also is there no better source for box office than Buzzfeed? Wikipedia was cited there too.
I'm nit picking. It's very thorough and will, like all McGilligan biographies, stand the test of time.
Louis CK pushed things to the edge, and continues to do so, but the content and timing of this one was not idea. Ten years earlier it might've been okay but who knows.
It's very Woody Allen, specifically Manhattan with its black and white widescreen photography, classical music, show business milieu, romancing actresses, being interested in the sex lives of young girls With John Malkovich as a Woody Allen style director - acclaimed as a genius, charming, funny, with a reputation as someone into young girls accused of being a molesterer. Apparently Woody Allen was offered the lead but turned it down. Malkovich plays him more as a Polanski type figure (I sense a European actor would've worked better in the role but Malkovich gives off that sensibility).
There's a scee where Charlie Day mimes masturbating to the thought of the actress played by Rose Byrne - while Louis CK and Edie Falco are in the room. That's a little close to the bone. Anther scene has Rose Byrne going is it so bad if his daughter is with Malkovich? Plenty of things to discuss.
The cast also includes Edie Falco (as a very recognisable type - the put upon overworked producer), Pamela Adlon (kind of a cameo as CK's ex), Helen Hunt (CK's other ex), Chloe Grace Moretz (daughter), the voice of Albert Brooks. That's a hell of a cast.
I laughed a few times. Felt uncomfortable in other places. The parenting scenes seem to lack a little authenticity Maybe I'm wrong. The story telling is a little iffy - felt not quite enough story, or at least what was there wasn't developed.
I didn't know a lot about Rodgers - had heard the name and the title of Once Upon a Mattress and Freaky Friday - didn't put it all together. She's Richard Rogers' daughter but had her own successful career.
This is like Marvelous Mrs Maisel only her first husband was gay, dad a top composer, her BFF was Steven Sondheim (they contemplated getting married even knowing he was gay), and she's trying to make it as a composer rather than a comedian. But the milieu is the same, as is the fact she farms out her kids to nannies, and has an action packed sex life (dating Bill Goldman, Harold Prince). She worked on TV specials with Woody Allen.
Very honest. Funny. Moving. She can get wearying at times, then recovers with a great observation.
A child died. Had six kids. Gay husband hit her. Bad health towards end of life. Found things to whinge about. Kids turned out well. Smart.
No other book quite like it.
I'm a soft marker but I didn't mind it. Biggest problem, surprisingly, is Wallace Shawn. I normally love him but he's getting on now - his timing is a bit off, the candences slow. It's like Woody himself. Gina Gershon isn't quite right as his wife either. It is fun to see them in leads.
Shawn is a film critic at a festival. While Gershon flirts with a pretentious movie director Shawn chases after a doctor - you guessed it, a younger woman, played by Elena Anaya. And you guessed it Gershon used t be a wild crazy bitch back in the day.
Anyaya is so far out of Shawn's league he never has a chance and there's no connection between the two apart from the fact he's from New York and she misses it. Maybe if she loved cinema and was older or he was younger...
Gershon can't wait to hook up with the movie director so it's not as though there are any stakes in the marriage. What's Shawn's dilemma - to be a critic or teach? Is that right?
The parodies of old films are fine eg The Seventh Seal. But this feels like another roughly formed first draft. Why not just have Swan play Woody with a younger wife and vicious paparazzi and some point...?
Nice scenery and photography.
One of those expanded New Yorker pieces - a part biography of Astor, part look at her diary trial, with a lot of the author inserting himself in the story (his bad first marriage, successful remarriage, career, obsession with Astor).
It's effective in it's own way. Astor was never a favourite of mine as an actor - competent, solid rather than awesome - but she had a great private life: horrible parents, early seduction by John Barrymore, widowed to Howard Hawks' low libido brother who died in a plane accident, crummy taste in husbands, torrid affair with George Kaufman (apparently great in the sack), alcoholism.
Once I got into Sorel's approach - it took a while - I enjoyed the book. It's an entertaining yarn.
Woody Allen reviewed the book for the New York Times here. Pre-cancelled, I guess. It's an entertaining review.
Kind of depressing. But Woody at his peak. Funny, inventive, beautiful production design. Mia Farrow is excellent as a waif, ditto Jeff Daniels as the character who steps out of the movie screen and the actor who plays him.
Fellow movie characters are played by John Wood, Zoe Caldwell and Van Johnson - they are terrific fun. Danny Aiello is all too believable as Farrow's horrid husband. Diane Wiest appears as a hooker. There were a lot of hookers in Allen films.
The ending is mean. But also perfect.
This is an end of an era film for Woody Allen in a way. The last time he really experimented with form, doing a musical. (He used to try to mix up the form every few movies - meta rom com, sci fi, Fellini-esque, pseudo documentary - but after this basically stopped taking visual risks). It's a lively piece with some fun numbers and tunes.
It was also the first time he had some spectacularly awful casting - Julia Roberts and Woody are an utterly mismatched pair. I love Julia Roberts, her acting is lovely but she's totally not suited to being with Woody; it started a depressingly long trend where he was teamed with much younger actors and where that age difference wasn't the point of the story. The flipside of that is that this has some really nice casting - Drew Barrymore's role was something of a turning point for her, she'd normally played vixens as a grown up but the "good girl" type she plays here would be a lot more lucrative for her; Natasha Lyonne had her first lead role with this; it's early parts too for Natalie Portman, Billy Crudup and Edward Norton. Goldie Hawn plays the Mia Farrow role. Tim Roth is hilarious as an ex con.
The musical conceit has the actual actors singing - like what Peter Bogdanovich tried to do with At Long Last Love. Like that this is a shaggy dog story among the rich - Allen's feels like it should have been set in the 30s, with its (mostly) super rich protagonists living a la la lifestyle, but was set in the present in day, presumably for cost.
It ambles along. There's some funny jokes. The last half hour is a drag because the key subplots have resolved (Barrymore is back with Norton, Roberts has dumped Allen) and the climactic number is between Allen and Hawn (who we've hardly spent time with). It was having a good time until then.
Some scenes make me a little awkward, I admit, considering the allegations against Allen: Natalie Portman running around on the beach in a swimsuit when she was very young; super young Lyonne being sexually precocious at 17 (I think - though is she meant to be older than Drew Barrymore?) and telling her father she wants to get marriage.
Woody Allen has become such a lazy filmmaker over the past 20 years it's hard at times to remember when he took genuine risks, in script and direction. This is a bold quasi-documentary look at a chameleon like figure.
Technically it's a wonder - the merging of real and fake footage is excellent. Occasionally Allen betrays himself going for the gag over character, falling into his old Love and Death trap.
Mia Farrow is very sweet.Maybe the piece could've done with another fleshed out support character or two.
Woody was really hanging his dick out on this one.A remarkable piece of work - self exposing, fierce, honest, bold. All his flaws are on display though not endorsed... he would lose this skill/desire. I love how at this stage he was keen on experimenting with visual looks... he would lose that skill/desire.
The lead performances are superb. Sydney Pollack is magnificent in one of his biggest parts as a successful businessman looking for meaning with a fair streak of c**t in him. The woman who plays his aerobics instructor girlfriend is terrific and their domestic violence scene is fantastic. Mia Farrow is superb - ditto Liam Neeson, Judy Davis, Woody himself, Juliette Lewis.
Every now and then you go 'hang on, Woody is that how it is".... the nasty depiction of Mia Farrow's passive aggressiveness, showing Lewis to be a middle aged man-hungry mantrap. But he puts it out there.
Lots of fun. One of Allen's best scripts - I wish he'd work with Doug McGrath again - and a superb cast, including John Cusack (pretentious Greenwich Village artiste), Diane Weist (grand dame of theatre), Chazz Palmenteri (gangster who has a gift for writing), Jennifer Tilly (bimbo... Allen used this trope too many times but she's very funny).
I felt it actually wasn't that well directed - it needed snap and energy but there's these long takes and it felt flabby. That's just my thoughts, anyway.
This was really fun. For me it was the best Woody Allen film to date. The humour felt more grounded. It was about something - life of a man in Napoleonic era. Diane Keaton is given a bigger part and makes it gold.
Sometimes it's too gaggy - they go for gags over character. Sometimes too silly.
But generally very good. Looks great - I wish he hadn't stayed in New York for so long after this. The historical slant is fantastic. Some classic moments.
Woody Allen used to put in effort. I'm not a massive fan of this film... maybe I saw it too late in life or something.. but it's imaginative and has some funny moments. It's unusual in Allen's oeuvre in that it involves sci fi and a lot of big prop gags. But it does have his first solid on screen relationship with a woman (played by Diane Keaton)... this was on top of Play It Again Sam of course, which he didn't direct.
Keaton is lovely - gorgeous and lots of fun. The film doesn't fully work for me but I can get why it has fans.
I'll admit this is my "broccoli" Woody Allen. I admire it. Know it's good for me. But it doesn't do it for me.
The ambition was wonderful. Gutsy move. He doesn't take these risks anymore.
Extremely well acted. How good was Diane Keaton? Mary Beth Hurt is excellent as well. Geraldine Page, Maureen Stapleton. Kristin Griffith is good too though she has a less well fleshed out part - the hot sister, who suffers a rape attempt from Richard Jordan (a striking scene).
People talk in slightly expressionistic dialogue which takes a little time to get used to.
Allen later said he wished he'd introduced Maureen Stapleton's character earlier. He was right. I also wish he'd resolved more subplots (eg Jordan-Keaton, Hurt-Sam Waterston).
Beautiful photography and production design.
I think my main problem with the movie is this... it felt skin deep. Page was a perfectionist, Jordan is a bitter critic, Hurt is lost,Griffith insecure, Stapleton loud... and that's about it.
I enjoyed it. Admired it. But it's broccoli.
So good. So incredibly good. Tight. Smart. Funny. Sad. Grown up.
Alan Alda's slimy producer is a sensation. Mia Farrow is lovely in a not-much role. Woody very good in a more dramatic part - though he is married when pursuing Farrow, my heart didn't break for him that much. Joanna Gleeson's grumpy faced wife is very good.
Martin Landau is sublime, as is Anjelica Huston (admittedly another in Allen's long, long line of bitches be crazy, but still very good) and Jerry Orbach (whose sad eyed resignation as he deals with his snobby brother is a marvel of acting).
I even like the random grace notes of the sub sub plot involving Allen's sister. Maybe not so much him taking his young teen niece to movies. (Was that how it started with Soo Yi? Sorry, couldn't help myself.)
It's a masterpiece. No wonder Woody returned to the well several times in films such as Match Point and Cassandra's Dream.
Some funny lines. Janet Margolin is lovely. It's too much just on Woody. He would later realise his strengths at exploring character relationships. For instance, Louise Lasser has a brief scene as the fan of Allen's character... that would've been great for a whole subplot.
The ambling joke-joke-joke structure did get wearying after a while even though the film did hit on the tropes of the criminal genre (parents, wife, capture, escape from prison) it doesn't tell a story.
But for a first effort not bad.
This comedy has a great idea - Woody Allen goes to south America heartbroken and winds up leading a revolution. Some very funny jokes, and I love the banter with Louise lasser. I wish her part had been bigger and that she'd gone to south America with him. The main issue with the film for me is the lack of relationships the lead character has... the revolutionaries he deals with are sketchy as are the people in the US. It wouldn't have been too hard to personalise a villain, use the love interest more, use a best friend more.
Allen would learn all these lessons. And it is funny.
His hair is very messy. The messiest of any comedy star?
Most Woody Allen films I re-watch I find my opinion hasn't changed. This one I like more. I think a lot of people feel that way. When it came out I get the impression people were offended by its depiction of Woody Allen fans.
Time has passed and now we can appreciate its boldness, the confidence of its visual look, the grotesques are entertaining. It is navel gazing and rips off Fellini shamelessly but interesting and some of it is very funny and moving.
Charlotte Rampling is superb as Allen's (literally) crazy ex. Jessica Harper's potential girlfriend is a more typical Allen nutter (one in a long, long line of Allen women who had an affair with her college professor) - but Rampling has genuine pain and is scary and moving and wonderful. It's a performance as good as Cate Blanchett's in Blue Jasmine. There's entertaining turns from people like Tony Roberts as himself and Daniel Stern. Sharon Stone blows a kiss at the beginning.
Full of fascinating personal insights to Allen's life and things that have unexpected resonance: deciding to be with a sensible woman who has young kids, him picking up cast members (it's how he meets Rampling), Rampling accusing him of wanting her 13 year old cousin.
It's superbly designed, shot and edited.
