Movie Stats:
Released 1977 (USA)
American, in English
Director – Woody Allen
Stars – Woody Allen, Diane Keaton
Plot Summary:
Follows the love story of comic Alvy Singer (Allen) and
actress/singer Annie Hall (Keaton) from beginning to conclusion. Surprise (to
me) appearances by Christopher Walken as Annie’s brother Duane & Jeff
Goldblum – very briefly – as a party guest.
Warnings:
Very mild blue language; sexual scenarios/innuendo (no
nudity); and drug use.
Bad Stuff:
It feels like an hour and a half of Woody Allen analyzing
himself.
Listening to Allen stutter-talk grates on my nerves after a
while. The fact that Keaton’s character does it as well throughout the whole
movie was both distracting and annoying.
I’m not sure that I liked how much the film broke through
the 4th wall. On the one hand, it occasionally took me out of the
narrative. On the other, it was usually amusing.
Good Stuff:
It definitely has its funny moments. If you’re not a big fan
of Allen’s comedic style, however, I doubt you’d find it funny.
At its core, it’s very sweet. It’s a nice look at how people
come together and fall apart & there’s no judgment to it. In a way, it’s
like a narrative documentary.
It’s pretty realistic. No one is perfect. No one is always
likable. That made the characters believable and the story relatable for me.
The Verdict:
I had seen this before, more than once, but it had been a
while. I liked Allen’s stuff when I was younger. The older I get, however, the
less I like it and the more it kind of irritates me. Although this is one of
the shortest Best Picture winners I’ve seen, I found my attention drifting
about halfway through. I kept thinking, “Geez, way to drag your audience along
on your self-indulgent psychoanalysis, Woody!”
I’m sure that plenty of people love this movie. There are
probably many more that loathe it. For me, it was okay. Decent, but not a
homerun. It’s definitely one of the ones to see just so you can say, “Oh yeah,
I’ve seen that!”
I give the film 3 stars.
2 comments:
Oh yeah, I've seen that. Just recently, in fact. And I was not a fan. There's that one shot at the beginning where they are talking and it's a long shot and they are very tiny but you can hear them clearly. Then you see more and more of them as they walk closer to the camera. That part I liked. The rest? Ugh!
Haha. It's definitely a very 70s movie. Perhaps it just hasn't held up well.
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