Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)

A strange man defecated on my sister.

Landau plays the lead....so who who do you think he stole the film from? Himself?

R2 Stole from Woody Allen and Mia Farrow. His story was so much better than theirs.

It is a good movie!

The Woody/Mia/Alda story is there to provide contrast and perspective to the Landau/Huston story (as well as some humor). Personally, I don't think a movie that focused on either story alone would be as good or interesting. Woody revisited the themes of the Landau/Huston story in Match Point, as a straight thriller, and I never got the praise for that film.

I think C&M is one of Allen's best films (top five, easily) but it does have the uncomfortable air of self-confession now.

R5 Self-confession from Woody Allen?

I think the Landau/Huston/Orbach/Claire Bloom storyline could have been a great standalone movie.

[quote] The Woody/Mia/Alda story is there to provide contrast and perspective to the Landau/Huston story (as well as some humor). Personally, I don't think a movie that focused on either story alone would be as good or interesting. Woody revisited the themes of the Landau/Huston story in Match Point, as a straight thriller, and I never got the praise for that film

Agree with all of this. I also think it’s his best movie, where everything he ever wanted to achieve as a filmmaker truly came together.

What was the deal with Daryl Hannah in this movie? She appears briefly in what seems like a truncated performance and isn't even mentioned in the credits.

Anjelica was great in Manhattan Murder Mystery, too.

[quote] Landau plays the lead....so who who do you think he stole the film from? Himself?

Such a literalist. Stole the picture can be taken to mean “gave the standout performance.”

I love this picture too. It’s so picturesquely bitter. Life sucks even amongst the privileged classes of Manhattan, and you really only thrive by being a piece of shit.

I usually can't stand Alana Alda, but I thought he stole the movie: he had the best lines and played a egomaniacal bastard to the hilt. Supposedly his role was inspired by the comedian Larry Gelbart.

The film was perfectly cast.

R10 Alan Alda played the same character in The Object of My Affection, except he was a publisher and married to Allison Janney.

The ending was inspired.

^It is, and the pianist is Liberace, of all people, and it’s gorgeous.

Anjelica Huston gave a great performance

Indian food, champagne and Singin’ In The Rain.

Love it.

A fantastic film in every way. Plus, I love the aesthetic of the sprawling late-80s mansion where Landau lives (it reminds me of my childhood). The single shot sequence where Landau discovers Huston’s corpse is brilliantly shot, as is the entire film. A masterpiece.

My choice for his best film too.

But I like or love all but a few of them from 1977-94. That was peak Woody. The only ones from that run I'd throw back are Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy, September, and Shadows and Fog. That's 3 out of 19 (counting New York Stories).

Landau was never better; Alda was a revelation. The scene with Dolores being obliviously stalked by the mob assassin is brilliantly cut and scored (with the Schubert quartet No. 15).

We probably should have seen the Mia/Woody split coming by the way Allen wrote their characters in the films in which they were paired romantically. In the earliest films (Zelig, Broadway Danny Rose), things tend to work out for them. At the midpoint, in Hannah and Her Sisters, they are fond exes. In the later films (this one, New York Stories), their characters turn out to be ill-matched. Then their last film, Husbands and Wives, imitated life in ways not planned.

Love, love, LOVE this movie. Anjelica Huston gives my favorite performance but everyone is top notch.

I don’t know if I can do a top five Woody, but my favorite films of his besides this one are Love and Death, Annie Hall, Interiors, Manhattan, Zelig, Hannah and Her Sisters, Radio Days, Another Woman, Husbands and Wives, and Deconstructing Harry.

I haven’t truly loved (though Midnight in Paris and Blue Jasmine had their moments) anything he’s made since DH, which would have honestly been a perfect final film, considering its ending.

I like this movie too, and this is my favourite Allen period (late 80s, early 90s), but if i admire it intellectually, it leaves me cold. I don’t think the noir-bergman combo works, at least emotionally. My favourite film of his is Another Woman, which actually makes me cry.

Having said all this, I absolutely love how old (age appropriate) everyone looks. It is an adult film in every way. Can you imagine casting people today of those ages looking like that.

I’m a huge Woody fan and actually own all his films on dvd/blu (I made sure to complete my collection around the time of the Allen Vs. Farrow hbo doc for fear he would be permanently cancelled and the films impossible to find). While perhaps not his very best, I do find myself returning to a few as basically comfort food even if they are not his best (Alice, Manhattan Murder Mystery, Scoop, Everyone Says I Love You, Celebrity), but if forced to choose a Top 5 Best Films I’d have to say Hannah & Her Sisters, Manhattan, Annie Hall, Crimes & Misdemeanors, Midnight In Paris and then my all-time dad and away favorite Husbands & Wives at the very top head and shoulders above all the rest.

R18 DH is his last one I truly loved as well.

I also think it’s very fitting that this happened to be the film that closed out the decade (what was probably his strongest films overall). Hilarious when it needed to be but also dark and haunting:

Very true about their relationship evolution as well. That said, Woody and Mia had a very easygoing chemistry in this, like an old married couple.

[quote]I haven’t truly loved (though Midnight in Paris and Blue Jasmine had their moments) anything he’s made since DH, which would have honestly been a perfect final film, considering its ending.

I thought Sweet and Lowdown (1999) was a really good one, but I generally agree. From the 21st century, the four I would recommend to people who have a history of liking Allen films are Match Point, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Midnight in Paris, and Blue Jasmine. None of those four is worthy of the pantheon, but they're above average as his later work goes.

R9. not only do you not understand what "stealing a picture" means---you also do not understand what "literal" means.

I love this film. I go back and forth on whether the ending I supposed to be ambiguous or is a mistaken idea of Woody’s and the secret at the core of all his problems: if I got away with it, did it even happen, and does it even matter? I could believe Woody is a nihilist in this way. Maybe he doesn’t feel the ominous vibe the movie leaves me with, that maybe you can’t see the moral rot happening, but it is happening.

I'd like to watch Husbands and Wives. I haven't seen that yet.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say Manhattan Murder Mystery is his best film.

[quote] I’m a huge Woody fan and actually own all his films on dvd/blu (I made sure to complete my collection around the time of the Allen Vs. Farrow hbo doc for fear he would be permanently cancelled and the films impossible to find).

R20 did you buy a box set?

The last good film Woody Allen made.

Three, R27.

OP - when you're right, you're right! Annie Hall was my favorite before seeing Crimes, (and I had seen all of them). Crimes floored me! It's in my top 5 favorite movies of all time!

I'd always seen Alda in nice guy roles but always felt that, personally, he was probably kind of squealy and pretentious. His casting was spot on. "If it bends, it's funny. If it breaks, it's not funny." .... and this prescient piece of dialogue:

...."Idea for series - a wealthy, high-profile builder who's always trying to realize grandiose dreams, a la Donald Trump, to be shot in New York."

R29, which ones? I need to build up my Woody Allen collection.

[quote] Then their last film, Husbands and Wives, imitated life in ways not planned.

All his films are confessions. Films on the couch, sorta.

Mia was the weak link in movie . Movie was brilliant

[quote]r8 What was the deal with Daryl Hannah in this movie? She appears briefly in what seems like a truncated performance and isn't even mentioned in the credits.

Daryl Hannah’s role was initially bigger. Sean Young’s performance was cut out of the movie entirely.

Young was also edited out of Mr. Allen’s “Alice”.

It's Woody Allen's best, and one of the best movies ever made. The peak of his talent. Nearly all of the movies he released after it, with the exception of Husbands and Wives, felt so slight.

He remade Crimes and Misdemeanors at least twice (same basic plot and themes) but those weren't nearly as good.

Bullets Over Broadway is my fave.

Woody's best years were his work with Diane Keaton & Mia Farrow. And count me in as another big fan of this fine film that doesn't put a step wrong.

Deconstructing Harry and Celebrity are more fun than their reputations suggest.

“I love him like a brother — David Greenglass” is one of my favorite bits of movie dialogue ever. I like this movie and Purple Rose of Cairo because there’s no happy ending, unlike Hannah and her Sisters.

Why did Mia have runny nose in many scenes?

Because they required it

Was she supposed to be a coke head?

“Another Woman” (1988) is an amazing film. Definitely in my top three of Woody Allen films — he was never better at that point. Both Gena Rowlands and Sandy Dennis should have both been nominated and Rowlands was in win territory that year.

And DL fave Betty Buckley also has a great cameo in it.

I watched just the other night. For about the fifth time I guess. I especially enjoy Anjelica Huston’s performance. The Woody character is annoying as always. It’s funny to watch the dynamic between him and Mia, with Mia portrayed as the intensely desirable prize. Maybe he still saw her that way then?

Funny, I don’t remember the Mia/Woody part at ALL.

I feel like he did that split narrative in “Melinda and Melinda”, but it didn’t work there.

It’s interesting to see the evolution of his work. I don’t care what anyone says, he’s done some priceless work.

Anjelica Huston’s character was so annoying that I was glad Landau’s character got away with having her killed. I didn’t like having that feeling.

I agree that his best period ended with Deconstructing Harry, after that it went down really fast. There are nice moments, especially Blue Jasmine, mostly due to Blanchett. Even Midnight in Paris wasn’t all that. The nadir was the period of Jade Scorpion.

I haven’t seen the last 3 or 4 films, got fed up of being irritated and not recognizing anything new or interesting. Maybe i hold him up to higher standards and if those movies were from another director I would enjoy them.

But yes, he has a great body of work, and around 10 films or so which i love and revisit again and again.

It's kind of strange since their relationship ended up so toxic, but I really do think Woody peaked with the Mia years. Even the lesser films were enjoyable to watch, and as mentioned, Another Woman was his best straight drama film. He continued to make good films up through Deconstructing Harry but after that it seemed like he was just grinding films out for lack of anything better to do.

We made plans! I gave up things for you, business opportunities! I WANT TO SPEAK TO MIRIAM!!

I especially liked the scene where Judah called his brother for exactly the reason his brother knew he had called, feigned innocence, and then the brother called Judah out on his BS "aloof" "high-handed" act.

I saw C and M a long time ago and remember liking it. Agree with the poster above that Alan Alda often plays nice guys but actually seems more like a dark character.

Jade Scorpion may have been a bit meandering but Helen Hunt had the best chemistry with Woody after Diane Keaton and Mia. It would’ve been better if woody hadn’t cast himself.

I can watch Blue Jasmine over and over thanks to Cate Blanchett doing her best Judy Davis impression.

Cafe society was surprisingly enjoyable. Great photography.

Mia brought a touch of class to Woody’s movies. She just did.

Is Crimes and Misdemeanors streaming anywhere?

I tried watching Another Woman, but the stilted behavior and dialog made it look as if Allen had no firsthand knowledge of what human beings were like.

I really need to watch C&M to clean my palate..

I'm not sure it's Allen's best, but I'd probably call this one his most entertaining film. Totally absorbing. "If it beeeeeends, it's funny!" Just great.

R55 I think it's his best because there is so much to it, and it all works. Landeau and Huston are PERFECTION-as everyone mentions, Alan Alda might be the funniest non-Woody Allen played characters in any of Woody's movies. The words of Louis Levy, the philosopher who the Allen character is making a doc about, are brilliant and moving. The flashbacks to the philosophical discussions from Landeau's youth (below) are wonderful- the horrible story Woody's sister tells him- it all works. A two hour meditation on the nature of good and evil, and consequences, and lack of consequences. I adore it.

R54 I couldn't find it anywhere, and then I remembered the public library and ordered the DVD from there.

Martin Landau was nominated Best Supporting for Crimes. I remember I was pissed because I really thought he belonged in the lead category, which would have left room for Alan Alda to be nominated.

Best Actor went to DD Lewis for My Left Foot, supporting to Denzel for Glory. (each their first). Both were destined to win no matter what, but I think Landau could easily have replaced at least two of the other Best Actor nominees, and Alda was better than at least two of those nominated for supporting.

^^P.S. Angelica was nominated supporting for Enemies: a Love Story that year. So you can't really say she was snubbed. :)

Me again. Don't EVEN get me started on the Best Picture category. Ugh!

They had Zelig, Stardust Memories and Another Woman at Dollar Tree. I stop in now and then for old time's sake.

It’s amazing that it’s not on any major streaming platform. It was on Amazon and that’s where I used to watch it, but now only the trailer is left.

It’s because everyone and his brother is starting their own streaming service, in all likelihood, and the rights reverted to someone with intention to have it as part of what they’ll be offering.

For now it’s on YouTube be split into 13 parts. It’s still watchable even though there’s a momentary flip from one part to the next.

Now that many years have passed and one looks back at his body of work, and considers what we now know about him, many of his "masterpieces" are considerably less so. I used to love Manhattan, I can hardly watch it now.

But Crimes still seems just about perfect. Including Woody's portrayal. Definitely his best!

1. Crimes

2. Annie Hall

3. Manhattan

4. Stardust Memories

5. Love & Death

6. Radio Days

7. Hannah and Her Sisters

8. Take the Money and Run

9. Interiors

10. Broadway Danny Rose

[quote] The last good film Woody Allen made.

And it was One Third Of A Century ago.

I always felt that Alan Alda was just playing himself in this. Angelica Huston is great. Caroline Aaron telling Woody that her date tied her up and shit on her is tragic, gross and hilarious all at the same time. And I love the scene with Woody and Martin at the end.

Woody’s 1980s and 1990s Mia era was his best - and weirdly, she was one of his weakest leading ladies. True, most actresses couldn’t stand up to the Dianne Wiesst, Judy Davis and Diane Keaton in comedic dramas but Mia Farrow was so wan and pale and weak to me.

Funny how in the 80s a lot of these movies were greeted very patronizingly as Woody taking himself too seriously, trying to be a mini-Bergman. All that may be true, but these movies hold up really well. Re-watching them recently, they seem to me minor classics. Another Woman, as other posters have noted, is a wonderful movie. And Crimes and Misdemeanors is as well. I find the last shot (the blind Rabbi dancing with his daughter to I'll Be Seeing You - yes, yes, obvious symbolism) incredibly haunting.

I don't know if it will ever happen, and no need to remind me of the reasons why it would be some time far in the future, but I wish Allen would get the sort of comprehensive collection that Criterion has put out in recent years for some of his idols, like Bergman and Fellini. His films never had very good DVD/Blu-ray presentations. I have a lot of the DVDs from the '70s-'90s period, and they're very basic. Picture and sound could be described as "At least it's better than VHS tapes," and there's zip by way of supplemental material beyond the trailers.

As many times as he's swung and missed in the last few decades, he's still an important American filmmaker with a lot of classics to his name.

Mia was brilliant as a passive aggressive twat in Husbands and Wives but I don’t think the role was much of a stretch for her.

R69, Allen is against extras on DVDs so Criterion would never touch him.

It's also a pity how none of the great soundtracks to his movies are streaming. Purple Rose wasn't even issued on CD, I don't think Crimes and Misdemeanors had an album at all.

I think “Sweet and Lowdown” was fantastic, and no one ever talks about it. It’s one of my favorite Woody movies. Samantha Morton is brilliant as always, and Sean Penn is, too.

I have to finally watch this film! Where is it streaming?

I’m a big fan of Match Point. I like the London setting and the blessed absence of Woody himself.

LOVE Match Point! Just re-watched it and it holds up beautifully.

You know what sucked? “Mighty Aphrodite”. I wonder if Woody hooked up with one of his adopted daughters’ birth mothers. Gawd that was a stinker.

I thought the Greek chorus in “Mighty Aphrodite” was frequently hilarious.

^Mighty Aphrodite was the first Woody Allen movie I saw! It came to our small town for a single weekend as a double feature with Il Postino. My father took me to see it and I laughed my ass off. He told me his other films are vastly superior and the humour is all the same, but I loved it anyway.

Manhattan was always awful. Friends of the Woody character set him up on a date with very young Mariel Hemingway? So unbelievable. Unless they're all sex trafficking. Mariel's character was supposed to be attracted to Woody.

This is also one of the last Woody Allen films where he plays a complete loser, and it’s all the better for it.

Match Point is one of ScarJo’s best performances. Sexy, spoiled and obnoxious. It takes a brave actor to play someone that unlikable honestly.

I remember there being quite a to-do when ScarJo didn’t get nominated for Match Point.

R66 "I always felt that Alan Alda was just playing himself in this. "

Is that a criticism? It's why I thought his casting was perfect. It was the first time I had ever seen him play a sleazy weaselly character, not the nice guys he usually portrayed. Like Woody's only direction was, "just be yourself and say the lines".

Great film. It's funny to see Alice mentioned a few times in here. I know it's not usually considered one of his greats, but I have such affection for that film. It casts such a spell.

Alan Alda is not a nice guy which is why he seems so comfortable in his role in C & M.

1. Crimes

2. Purple Rose of Cairo

3. Manhattan Murder Mystery

4. Radio Days

5. Another Woman

6. Hannah and Her Sisters

7. Interiors

8. Manhattan

9. Bullets Over Broadway

10. Small Time Crooks

I agree that Mia was a weak link in most of his films. For me the one exception was Broadway Danny Rose. It was the first time I can recall her playing a character unlike her real self. I thought she was Oscar-worthy. Possibly her greatest perf aside from the iconic Rosemary's Baby.

I thought Alan Alda deserved a late-career nomination for Marriage Story.

But, yes, the horrific stories about him are apparently true. He’s also an asshole in a theater setting.

He’s really great in Manhattan Murder Mystery (one of my favorite Woody Allen films, comedy or drama) and has wonderful, easy chemistry with Diane Keaton in it. I believe that Keaton was a last-minute substitute for Mia who dropped out of the project after the Soon-Yi thing broke.

Mia did not drop out of Manhattan Murder Mystery. She still wanted to be in it. Woody Allen fired her.

I think Anjelica was also a last-minute replacement in MMM. I just can't remember for who. Maybe he bumped up Keaton?

[QUOTE] Mia did not drop out of Manhattan Murder Mystery. She still wanted to be in it. Woody Allen fired her.

My bad, R90. I don’t think I knew that. However it came to be, I’m glad Diane played her part. She’s hysterical in the movie. I love it when she sneaks into the neighbor’s house and he comes home in the middle of her snooping.

1) Crimes

2) Annie Hall

3) Purple Rose of Cairo

4) Sleeper

5) Bullets Over Broadway (didn't like as much at first, got better over time. HATED Jennifer Tilly first time I saw it, was way too over-the-top. Today I'd give her the Oscar!)..

6) Broadway Danny Rose

7) Love and Death

8) Interiors (also now one of his funniest, but not for the right reasons)

9) The game show sequence in Everything You Always Wanted to Know...

10) Deconstructing Harry

Honorable Mentions: Match Point, Another Woman, and Blue Jasmine for Cate Blanchett

Fallen Favorites: Hannah and Manhattan used to be 2 & 3 for me, but have not aged well in my eyes.

R88, Mia did portray a version of herself a couple of times, but she was also amazing in "Radio Days" (which I think is one of Allen's most under-rated efforts). And she's very, very good in "Zelig".

"Hark, I hear the cannons roar!" Comedy gold, followed by, "Who is Pearl Harbor?"

I also just rewatched Match Point recently with my bf and he fell asleep 15 mins into it, but I continue to love it anyway (he is another story, jk). I always wondered what the real story was behind Kate Winslet dropping out of Match Point at the very last minute, opening the door for ScarJo. As great as Kate generally is, it would have been a much different film with her in the role of Nola… ScarJo’s chemistry with Jonathan Rhys-Meyers was off the charts and Woody showcases her so spectacularly.

I loved Emily Mortimer in Match Point.

R84. Not a criticism at all. From what I’ve heard about Alda this role seemed closer to his real personality and he did a great job.

Kate Winslet as Nola? Noooo. ScarJo was perfect, so sexy. And yes, Emily Mortimer was very good too.

It just occurred to me, Match Point is basically A Place in the Sun with a happy ending.

Hanna and Her Sisters is my favorite Woody Allen film. Maybe it's the rare (for Woody) hopeful ending.

His reworking of the masters is fascinating to me, not always successful but always fascinating. Bergman in Interiors and A Midsummer Night Sex Comedy, Chejov in Hanna, Williams in Blue Jasmine, Fellini in Stardust Memories and To Rome with Love, etc.

Another Woman is also a Bergman take (“Wild Strawberries”).

R98 You call that a happy ending? That's pretty fucking demented.

Crimes and Misdemeanors was my first introduction to Allen films and it's still my favorite. He clearly likes to rehash several themes, getting away with a problematic woman's murder being one of them.

It is also an excellent balance of humor and heavy disturbing themes. I also love the symbolic way he uses religion--the rabbi literally going blind and Mickey's attempt to convert to Catholicism the way you'd pick up a new hobby, ultimately leaving him cold. The 2 oldest Western religions are rendered out of touch and out of place.

Plus the scenes between Allen and Alda are just hilarious.

I'll add, what I love about Match Point is it's Woody Allen without being overtly Woody. The interpretation the actors – especially Rhys-Myers – give his lines without WOODY popping up every couple of scenes, is so good. Too often actors try to imitate Woody's cadence. The only really "Woody" parts for me are the scenes with the Emily Mortimer character's well-to-do parents, especially the mother.

I guess you could say the same about Blue Jasmine or others, but to me that one at least is still very Woody.

R98 You're being just a tad literal. "Happy ending" in the sense that he gets away with it. Doesn't go to the electric chair. Except for his guilty conscience, he's set for life.

Manhattan Murder Mystery was so much funnier than I expected it to be - genuinely hilarious in parts.

If you listen to Alda on Gilbert Gottfried's podcast, he doesn't come off well. Sort of an know it all, who didn't quite get the show. But, as I said, I think he's wonderful in Crimes.

Mia played her own personality in this. She's duplicitous in real life, grooming her natural daughter to say Woody molested her because she was humiliated that he had sex with her Previn child. Mia was pathological enough to even use a song written by Andre Previn's wife, the woman whose marriage she broke up, about being molested by her father in the attic. This song is the basis of Mia's deception, she may not even realize it was her inspiration for Dylan's claims:

Sorry, I know this thread is about Crimes, but I'm enjoying the meandering discussion about Woody's movies.

One of my favorite lines in Match Point is when Scarlett is described as "a lady of the sauce."

I view Crimes as a sort of Schroedinger’s cat Woody confession that he did the things he was accused of, but also didn’t do them because no one could prove it.

R108 it predates the accusations.

[quote] My bad, [R90]. I don’t think I knew that. However it came to be, I’m glad Diane played her part. She’s hysterical in the movie. I love it when she sneaks into the neighbor’s house and he comes home in the middle of her snooping.

It’s interesting because most of Mia’s other roles seemed very tailored to her strengths, but I can’t think of an actress who would have been LESS suited for Manhattan Murder Mystery - if you didn’t know any better you would assume that it had been written for Keaton. Woody ended up being the straight man in that movie.

I'm pretty sure Woody just watched Fatal Attraction and thought, 'I'll make the same movie but in this one the guy kills the psycho mistress and it's about if he can get away with it'.

r95, it would have made more sense with Kate Winslet in the role, because the movie makes this big deal about how Scarlett Johannson is a 'failed actress' even though she's only about 20 and hardly passed her prime. Wheras Winslet would have been about 30 so more appropriate.

No, but Scarlett was intensely sexy, and probably a terrible actress. Plus American, that added a little something.

R111 Yes, except what he said was, "What if I made A Place in the Sun, but with a happy ending? Ya-ya-ya know, he gets away with it. Wins the jackpot. Just by a quirk of fate!"

Since Woody refuses to watch his own films once they are finished, it’s unlikely there will be a better resource or pseudo director’s commentary than the exceptional Eric Lax interview book (covering up to 2009) and the more recent Start To Finish biography that was recently updated (it covers everything up to Irrational Man, a rare dark drama that hasn’t been mentioned yet in this thread, but deserves a mention at least). Endless details and tidbits about cut scenes, cut actors, reshoots, etc.. Highly recommended.

And here’s the interview book.

Thanks, R115, just got Start to Finish on Kindle.

I had a friend who worked as crew a lot back in the day and she told me if you worked on film sets in NY and wanted to be home in time for dinner with your kids the only directors you could rely on were Woody Allen and Sidney Lumet.

SLEEPER is rarely given proper credit (only one person has mentioned it on their list in this thread). For me, it's peak Allen comedy. Certainly Allen's most brilliantly-realized "pure comedy" film, and possibly one of the most visually and thematically ambitious comedies ever conceived. It was also the first Woody Allen film I ever saw as a child, so it holds a special place in my heart. But that's not why I laud the film. It simply is a masterpiece.

Firstly, the concept itself is hilarious: a nebbish granola-loving vegetarian wakes up 300 years in the future. A classic fish-out-of water tale, but with an Orwellian twist that raises the stakes to keep the tension high. As an "alien" from the past, Allen's character Miles is bewildered to awaken in the future, but barely has time to come to grips with this fact before having to embark on living life as a fugitive. He can never relax - Big Brother is around every corner. Does he keep running, assimilate into society, or join the resistance?

And then the there's the stylized visuals...dear lord, the visuals! The use of existing architectural wonders such as 1963's Sculptured House by Charles Deaton in Genessee, Colorado really sell the world-building of this film. The starkly retrofuturistic interiors with absurdly non-ergonomic furniture provide laughs while fleshing out the message that humankind has lost touch with itself. The Orgasmatron pushes this theme to its funniest, yet most heartbreaking conclusion: Technology has taken the place human connection, and we no longer need to lift a finger toward our fellowman -- not even to experience the pleasurable intimacy sex. Alienation is total.

Now let's talk about pacing--it never let's up. There is a constant moving-forward due to the pressure of having to remain on the run, and also a mounting sense of urgency that someone must Do Something Soon to wrest society from its hypnotic complacency. There are, to be sure, deliberate pauses for visual gags to unfold, like when he is hungry and discovers a garden of gigantic vegetables, and has trouble running away with the enormous crops. But even then, these detours are short, and lead us always to the next plot point.

Diane Keaton (Luna)'s character arc from spoiled, lazy, detached narcissist to tree-dwelling rebel is a joy to behold. The see-sawing of where Miles starts out and where Luna end's up -- the Freaky-Friday switcheroo that their characters do -- is so frustratingly great.

The dialogue in the film is steadily hysterical. Every scene is filled with classic, quotable one-liners as well as cleverly underscoring the unique traits of each character. Take for instance, when Miles and Luna are disguised as doctors and are pulled aside and asked to clone a nose, and Miles attempts to to stall: "I think what the computer is failing to take into account is what I call 'The Pinocchio Effect,' which states that the square root of the proboscis is equal to the sum of the sinuses....over seven." Who else could come up with something so crazy? Then there's Luna (Keaton), previously shown to be not so smart. She also attempts to stall the operation, though in a less verbose way: "Give us a moment. A medical moment" which I bet Keaton totally ad-libbed. (My friend and I still say "Give me a moment -- a medical moment," to this day.)

Finally, the ragtime score, as per usual with Allen's comedies, punctuates and enhances the absurdity of the proceedings.

Everything about SLEEPER is visual, intellectual, and comic poetry in motion. If you haven't seen it, coming in at a tight 89 minutes, it's well worth the time.

R118 I 'm the poster who had Sleeper in my top 10, for all the reasons you listed. (though you didn't mention the beauty pageant sequence!),

Now, thanks to you, I have to see it again!!

R118 I always preferred Love & Death, but this may need a rewatch.

[quote]Mia did not drop out of Manhattan Murder Mystery. She still wanted to be in it. Woody Allen fired her.

Didn't she actually show up on the set for a costume fitting AFTER publicly accusing him of molesting Dylan?

Not quite, R121, but she called the wardrobe person to try and schedule a fitting.

[quote]it would have made more sense with Kate Winslet in the role, because the movie makes this big deal about how Scarlett Johannson is a 'failed actress' even though she's only about 20 and hardly passed her prime. Whereas Winslet would have been about 30 so more appropriate.

Winslet got her "failed actress" film with him 12 years later, with Wonder Wheel. That's one I thought was, while not a masterpiece, better than its reception and better than the few before and the few after it. But it was released in 2017, as the tide was turning, and it was hard even to find a review that was entirely about the film.

My own top 10:

1. Crimes and Misdemeanors (the two sides of him in perfect balance) 2. Hannah and Her Sisters (nearly at C&M's level, but warmer) 3. Annie Hall (but of course; so many "smart" rom-coms that followed owe a debt to it) 4. The Purple Rose of Cairo (one of the greatest movies ever on the subject of movie love) 5. Husbands and Wives (unsparing relationship comedy/drama about and for mature adults) 6. Radio Days (pure delight; can make you nostalgic for a time you never experienced) 7. Zelig (dazzling technique and perfect artifice, but with something to say) 8. Manhattan (often treated nowadays like a prosecutorial exhibit, but it's better and more thoughtful than that) 9. Another Woman (the best assimilated of his obvious Bergman-inspired films) 10. Interiors (a very good first attempt at drama, with its craftsmanship and ensemble acting overcoming some try-to-hard stiffness)

Honorable Mentions: Manhattan Murder Mystery, Broadway Danny Rose, Bullets Over Broadway, Sweet and Lowdown, and the "early, funny one" of your choice. I like all of his pre-Annie Hall movies about the same, except for Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex, which is more variable and scattershot than the others.

My fave of the early comedies is Love & Death which I think has his best one-liners. From the 80s, it's probably Crimes which seems to me his most accomplished dramedy. From the 90s, Manhattan Murder Mystery - the chemistry between him and Keaton in middle-age is a thing of wonder. That said, I would still vote for Manhattan as his greatest of all. Today it's "problematic", but I think it's his tautest, funniest, and most piercing movie.

Jonathan Rhys Myers is just so perfect in Match Point. Charming, bright, sincere but stoic with something very dark brewing underneath. Everything he did was believable including shooting that poor old woman.

Claire Bloom was good as Landau's wife.

Bloom was a tart back in the day, too.

Bloom was really nasty about C&M. She hated the experience of making it and called the movie itself repellent (not even the morality of it, with killing the mistress, but something about Allen's "rediscovered Jewishness"). She disparaged the town in New Jersey where her part was shot. (Closter, I think?) It surprised me that she worked with him again in Mighty Aphrodite.

Re: Match Point, I remember thinking that sex scene in the field was really hot, and that wasn't something I expected to see in an Allen film. I wouldn't think of Rhys Meyers and Johansson quickly when naming great overall performances in Allen films, but their chemistry was strong, and that was a big part of the film.

I agree with all here that Crimes is fascinating, and for numerous reasons.

But something has always bothered me about it: what specifically does Angelica H think she can derive from exposing Martin Landau?

Is it simply vindictive payback? Or does she actually believe that she can threaten to destroy a man in order to retrieve the relationship with him? What man would shack up with her some more after she drags him through divorce, disrepute, and so on?

I'm also puzzled by this hysterical reaction to being dumped. We've seen men murder women who throw them over, even though it means the men will go to prison, so what have they gained? We've seen even women kill former lovers, though this is rarer and usually they just have nervous breakdowns, as Dory Previn so publicly did.

I mean, if Juliet had decided she really liked Paris after all, would Romeo have killed her?

Why do some people invest their self-esteem in a romance so conclusively? And why do they so remorselessly blame the lover who leaves? It's nobody's fault; it just happens.

R128 She always seemed bitchy to me.

Even as a young actress, Kate Winslet would have been "tall enough to be (JRM)'s mother.... Goliath!" And I don't think a Brit could have worked nearly as well in the role of an unsuccessful young actress. ScarJo was perfection.

r129 she threatened to destroy him if he didn't commit to her. Simple to understand.

r131 aside from her being too young to be over the hill, why was a beautiful young American actress trying to 'make it' in London anyway, instead of Hollywood? Scarlett's casting made no sense.

R129 That is why Anjelica Huston is brilliant as Dolores. You understand her hysteria. You feel for her. She wants to be loved.

Then you see her finals moments and her lying dead while Schubert's excellent String Quartet No. 15 in G Major plays.

In most movies, you don't remember the murder victim, but Huston stays with you. Maybe it was her, or Landau, or Schubert.

I’m like someone above and I couldn’t stand her - and was in a way relieved when she was offed (although very haunted by the actual scene). I thought that was purposeful so the audience felt complicit. But if so many felt differently then maybe not.

I remember the final scene of this movie when Claire Bloom walks in to see Landau and Woody speaking, she gives Woody such a dismissive look like he is not of the ilk their WASP set should be interacting with (basically, because he's visibly Jewish). I don't know if Claire was directed to do this, but it really shows what a great actress she is. American society will always be segregated with those people at the top of the pyramid.

My brothers girlfriend previously dated Alan Alda’s barber’s son, and he said Alda is a real mensch, a great guy with an excellent head of hair on him.

R129 all credit to Huston filling out a pretty one-dimensional role. I had the impression her anger was a combination of being deliberately led to believe Landau's character was going to leave his wife for her so she just needed to trigger that event because he was too cowardly to do it, and some straight up Fatal Attraction-style you won't get away with using me, I won't be IGNORED. One thing that was oddly interesting with their interaction that Huston and Landau made believable was while she was threatening to expose the affair because she loved him and want to be with him, he was also afraid she would expose but something she knew about his shady financial dealings. He feared her obsessive love for him would spill over into pure vindictiveness, which of course makes his judgment and conduct all the worse.

Landau wouldn't marry her because he belatedly realized that their 23 year age gap was inappropriate and problematic.

It's easier for me to count the Woody movies I didn't care for than the ones I love, and he's made a lot of movies. He truly is an amazing artist.

It's also worth noting, she was a flight attendant when they met. She likely thought she'd be set for life, when he left his wife. For him to rip that away must have heightened her sense of injustice.

R129 I thought Pauline Kael made an interesting point about Huston's character in her review:

"If Woody Allen were interested in drama (rather than pieties), he wouldn't make us reject the emotional plight of the doctor's mistress. The camera loiters on her rear end, as if to dehumanize her; she's presented as hulking and insistent, like the knife-wielder in Fatal Attraction. So the doctor's final acceptance of his crime against her has no horror. The film's emphasis is confusing: the spectator has more anxiety about the doctor possibly revealing his crime to the authorities than about what he does to her."

Christ Pauline Kael... beloved by some for her well-constructed sentences that were often just psycho-babble. She is the epitome of the The New Yorker navel-gazing.

C&M is a fine film, one of Allen's best. For me, he should have stopped making movie after movie after movie decades ago. Allen got lazy years ago and if there are good films after the 1990s, they are few and far between.

C&M has made its mark, here we are in 2022 talking about it and his career in 2022.

I liked Cafe Society. It was sad and elegiac and quite overtly (surprisingly, at this point) Jewish.

There was one shot that appeared as part of Landau’s regretful memories, his head in her lap and her gazing tenderly at him. I think that was meant to convey that she truly loved him and he knew it.

R143 I dont really agree with Kael there. It was important for us to be ambivalent about her- we NEED to relate to Landeau- and that way we're all sort of complicit. But I dont think anyone was happy about her murder.

I thought the brilliant thing about the film is that the audience IS complicit. There’s some very thorny moral landscape the audience is being drawn into and it’s successful if they’re in Judah’s camp at the end.

Woody's wife in this was such a bitch! Hilarious. Mia Farrow is brilliant as always because she's essentially playing herself: an ultimately shallow opportunist whose charm he mistakes for great depth.

That was peak JRM in Match Point. Painful to see how he blew up his career. He mentioned Allen does not allow any improv and actors have to say the words exactly in the script. Too bad because as much as I enjoyed MP, the dialogue was clearly written by an American for British setting. If I recall, it was originally set in NYC, but when Allen got funding from the uk, he switched it to London but didn't really change the script.

Allen wanted JRM in Match Point after watching Bend it like Beckham. He thought under that facade of a nice young football coach could be someone quite dark.

C&M is very good--it was not what one would have expected. Mia isn't very good, but she doesn't have a huge role. She strikes me as the weak link in Hannah & Her Sisters, too--her usually waify whining. She is very good In Radio Days and Zelig. Even though "Zelig" is a pop culture archetype, the film rarely seems to turn up. It's hilarious that she still expected to be cast in MMM---I don't think you have to defend Allen to recognize what amess Mia was/is. People tend to pair off with people of similar emotional development. Woody always let us know how limited his development was, so it makes sense not to give Mia a complete "benefit of the doubt".

Interiors seemed pretentious when it was released and more so now.

r152 Interiors is a black comedy. I'm constantly surprised that people don't get this.

I think his nadir was September. Even after re-shooting the movie with a new cast it was terrible.

I just watched Everyone Says I Love you for the first time. The musical conceit was kind of charming, but in the end it came across as empty and stupid as a Garry Marshall movie.

[quote] So the doctor's final acceptance of his crime against her has no horror.

I so disagree with Kael there. The doctor’s acceptance of his crime IS the horror, that he could end another person’s life like that and walk away intact, feeling justified, or not even caring.

[quote] I thought the brilliant thing about the film is that the audience IS complicit. There’s some very thorny moral landscape the audience is being drawn into and it’s successful if they’re in Judah’s camp at the end.

That’s always been my opinion as well. Glad I interpreted it “correctly,” or at least in some good company. Kael’s review is totally obtuse in my opinion.

I don’t think it’s a question of interpreting something correctly or incorrectly, R156, just more or less convincingly. I thought Kael’s point was interesting and it is important to consider how/why the audience can relate to Huston’s character, but you and others make good points as well.

Sadly, googling and youtube are telling me that CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS is not currently available on any streaming services. So, yeah, I checked.

Any ideas from all of you fans out there?

This works, R158.

R158: It's on YouTube, in 13 installments.

If you hook up correctly, they play consecutively with tiny hiccups at each transition.

I just watched it today..

I’ll repeat, I got the DVD from my public library. Granted I’m in Los Angeles so the county system has a lot of offerings. But I recently remembered it as a good way to get movies that aren’t streaming, or not to have to pay to rent.

There are two points in C&M when Anjelica Huston looks beautiful. One is when Dolores is alone and remembering the happier times at the beginning of the affair. We see Judah talking to her about classical composers, saying "I'll teach you. Someday, we'll have a lot of time." (We may infer he said other things like that and probably did lead her on when the affair was new and exciting. She's clingy, destructive, and unstable, yes, but her hopes for the relationship had a foundation in reality.) When that flashback runs its course and we're back in the present day, or maybe it's when we're going into it, there's a patented beautifully lit Sven Nykvist close-up of Huston's face.

The other time is when she's dead, at peace.

In other scenes, she looks the way Judah now sees her: unappealing, gauche, a harridan.

Regarding her threats, I think she had gotten to a point where there were only two outcomes. She would manage to back him down and he would stay with her out of fear (though as he points out, "Stupid threats and slander. This is your idea of love, right?") or she would destroy his family and professional life with the information she had. She would still be miserable, but at least he would be hurting too.

Anjelica Huston’s first scene in the film says everything: she’s a formidable, tall, confidant woman, almost inviting coercion. It’s just a scene of her walking the street with her groceries and going into her apartment, but it sets down so much about what will come to pass. She is in love with Judah and he said he would start a new life with her and she’s in.

There are three reasons to watch Interiors: Geraldine Page, EG Marshall and Maureen Stapleton. The younger actors are meh.

[quote] why was a beautiful young American actress trying to 'make it' in London anyway, instead of Hollywood? Scarlett's casting made no sense.

Because she was beautiful and young and had a Lolita-ish quality. She had her mouth hanging open all the time. Woody probably was attracted to her and wanted her in his movie.

Allen's original title for Crimes and Misdemeanors was "Brothers." He hated having to change it, but he had to because there was a 1984-89 sitcom on Showtime about three Philadelphia brothers, one of whom is gay. Those pre-Sopranos original series on pay cable really fell into the pop-culture chasm. No one ever talks about them.

It's so refreshing to be able to get on here and discuss Woody Allen films without feeling like you have to check the room for bugs. I"m so sick of feeling like it's shameful thing to still enjoy his work. Just so fucking sick of it.

In Crimes and Misdemeanors, Rebecca Schull plays the mother of the young man Judah's daughter is marrying. She's in a scene at the Rosenthal house when the two families are having a get-together, but she really lost out in the cutting: we only see the back of her head. She's talking about a friend going to a Chinese physician and getting a cat's whisker inserted in her tear duct, which is a theme Allen would pursue in his next film, Alice. Anyone who ever watched the NBC sitcom Wings will recognize "Fay's" distinctive voice.

Another actress who would become better known later, Frances Conroy, plays the woman who owns Judah's boyhood house and lets Judah come in and look around. She had been in Another Woman too, as the sister-in-law, Lynn, who tells Marion that Paul has always hated Marion.

R168 the lady who plays the socialist aunt at the flashback dinner table is excellent. That movie is loaded with fantastic performances.

R167, R168 and others... I don't know if Woody has always been personally involved in casting each and every role in all of his films, but when you watch Radio Days, Purple Rose of Cairo, Zelig, Shadows & Fog - movies that require flashbacks or are set in the 30s/40s, he and others are EXCELLENT at finding actors whose physical appearance seem to truly embody an earlier age. Think of the students in Alfie's classroom in Annie Hall...

Allen never had big budgets but he made the most of them--he used NYC in ways that no one other than maybe Sidney Lumet could. He had key craftspeople like Nyqvist, great musical scores and could attract great actors who were well cast. He worked with excellent casting directors. Contrast that with "franchises" that are overstuffed with gimmicks.

R170 Juliet Taylor cast all of Woody's movies from Love and Death to Cafe Society. He has said that Taylor introduced him to Meryl Streep, Dianne Wiest, Mariel Hemingway, Patricia Clarkson, et. al.

I think it was collaborative between him and Taylor and depended on the part. For example, I'm sure in 1989-90 Allen knew who William Hurt was and had seen him in a lot of movies and thought he would be good for Mia's rich snob husband in Alice (which he was). People who were less well established when he first used them were likely Taylor's finds.

This is an HD version.

Liam Neeson was never more adorable than he was in Husbands and Wives.

Woody goes on dates with a little girl in the movie who is said to be his niece, which I found incredibly disturbing.

The son in law was hot. Looked like James Wilby

The scene with Woody’s character and his niece going to the movies was totally unnecessary. The niece was played by Mike Nichols’ daughter Jenny.

R177, that was Gregg Edelman---but I did not recognize him either. He never looked that hot to me onstage, but in this film he really is cute.

R178 it is funny how directors will shoehorn in their fetishes. Like Tarantino with feet. “Hey, it’s my movie!”

The deck is stacked so unevenly that it undermines the point of the film.

“I will not be destroyed by this neurotic woman.”

Landau is wonderful in ED WOOD, but I think this is the performance for which he should have won his Oscar. He’s fantastic in it from start to haunting finish.

The poor old woman who is murdered in Match Point was Margaret Tyzack in her final role.

No, R183, her final role was on the BBC soap EastEnders.

ZELIG was a hilarious film built on a heart-achingly poignant foundation. HUSBANDS AND WIVES was a hilarious film built on a heart-achingly poignant foundation. STARDUST MEMORIES was a hilarious film build on a heart-achingly poignant foundation. HANNAH. BLUE JASMINE. PURPLE ROSE. I could go on.

He was so, so brilliant at that combination. The man seems to be lacking in empathy or remorse in real life, but boy can he ever make me life and cry at the same time. Like nobody else.

[quote]Woody goes on dates with a little girl in the movie who is said to be his niece, which I found incredibly disturbing.

I've seen that said elsewhere in recent years, and I don't really get it. He and his wife are childless; the girl's father isn't in the picture, and her mother (his sister) seems to be going through a difficult time. I don't see anything untoward about the uncle/niece relationship as it's shown. Maybe there's a temptation to impose motivations based on things that happened later in Allen's personal life, e.g., he's "grooming" the niece by taking her to old movies. But people do share their enthusiasms with other people in their lives. All that's "date"-like about it is that it's presumably scheduled.

I also think the Joanna Gleason character, Allen/Cliff's wife, is interesting. One can read her as just a straight-up bitch, but the way I see it, she probably has grown increasingly burned out. Maybe at one time she thought Cliff had promise and it was never fulfilled, and it's hard for her to keep being supportive after so many years.

One reason C&M is one of his best films is that he doesn't spare his own proxy character or deal him the highest cards. I can see why the wife doesn't love him any more, and I can see why the Mia Farrow character chooses the other guy (as much of a blowhard as he can be). Annie Hall was similar. We may feel for Alvy, but we see why Annie moves on. Alvy, not Annie, is the dead shark.

R186 Right and I feel like that is one of the great things about Annie Hall. He doesn't spare his proxy. He allows Annie to surpass Alvy. He shows how ridiculous Alvy is to tell Annie "Adult education is a wonderful thing." And then, once she starts to grow beyond him "Adult education is just junk." He shows exactly how his shortcomings led to him losing what was a gem of a girl. And not in a cutsy way, either. He's pretty honest there.

Joanna Gleason plays CUNT really well. She was almost scary as Mark Wahlberg’a mother in Boogie Nights.

Gleason didn't get those roles often enough. She has good comic timing which work in her usual roles, but I like her as Mommie Dearest, as well.

I feel for Gleason in this. She is a beautiful college professor who has two successful and loving brothers.

Yet she is trapped in a loveless marriage with a man who has no ambitions.

r190 Cliff has ambition, he just hasn't sold out to make commercial trash like Lester.

Does the movie make it clear if Allen's character is really good at what he does? I don't remember now.

He could be gifted but unlucky. Or he could be just a loser.

I did notice that the only female figure he seems completely at ease with is his niece, because she's the only one who likes him without qualification. Gleason is tired of him, Mia needs a more aggressive figure, his sister is wrapped up in her loneliness, etc.

When Allen and the niece are walking along the street eating their slices of pizza, you sense that this is the one pleasant association in his life. They're just having fun. Movies and food. But then look at how stunned he is when he sees Mia with Alan Alda. I mean, stunned to the point of almost ceasing to exist.

asa director and writer, Allen doesn't spare himself here.

[quote]Does the movie make it clear if Allen's character is really good at what he does? I don't remember now. He could be gifted but unlucky. Or he could be just a loser.

We don't see any of his work, other than the intentional sabotage of the Lester documentary, but I would say the film supports "loser." Cliff flatters himself that he makes challenging, honest documentaries on difficult subjects, and maybe that's his aim, but I don't think we're supposed to believe Cliff is as good at making documentaries as Woody Allen was at making comedies and dramas. For all the years he's toiled at it, he doesn't seem to be highly esteemed among those who evaluate such things. If he were, he'd have a bigger boasting point than winning honorable mention at a minor film festival years ago, where everyone who showed up got honorable mention.

But he's one of several characters whose occupation involves helping people see things more clearly, and vision/sight is such a big theme. Judah is an ophthalmologist, so it's very literal with him. Rabbi Ben provides spiritual counseling. Professor Levy's insights and language illuminate the human condition. Cliff makes documentaries about toxic waste and such. Lester doesn't help people see; he just gives them things to look at.

Cliff doesn't earn his own money, he is living off his wife it seems. No wonder she's at her wit's end. Cliff just spends his days watching old movies and fantasizing. "I never told you my weakness was going to the movies in the daytime." "I do it all the time." And then later on: "What are you doing with a copy of Singing in the Rain?" "Do you want to watch it?" "Don't you have anything else to do?"

When Alan Alda congratulates Joanna Gleason at the wedding reception for having met someone, it seems like a genuine and nice moment between brother and sister.

I just re-watched C&M because of this thread (and had a lot of moments to really look closely for because of the great posts here). The person upthread who mentioned that Claire Bloom looks dismissively at Woody Allen is totally right. I definitely saw that—it’s very blink-and-you’ll-miss-it.

The person had mentioned a possible anti-Semitic element to the quick look. But would that make sense if her character is married to a Jewish ophthalmologist? I guess that doesn’t preclude her from being an anti-Semite but I don’t know if I can go that far.

Anyway, I did notice it.

Also, I had completely forgot that Judah went back to Dolores’s apartment after she had already been murdered. Great scene.

Claire Bloom's character was a well-to-do Jewish matron. Claire herself is Jewish. I think the dismissive look was because Cliff gave off nebbish loser vibes and she was acting queenly.

I still can't believe Claire was married to Philip Roth – who later dated Mia.

r197, oh yes, I forgot they were at a Jewish event. Maybe it's because Claire and Martin Landau's characters give the impression that they can assimilate with the rich boring gentiles, wheras Woody does not.

My fave moment is Anjelica calling him on the phone with the ash from her cigarette sticking all the way out, like her mental state... one of those wonderful moments when the Landau section of the movie veers into dark comedy.

Nice work from Jerry Orbach as the thug brother.

He’s very good. I wonder if Cliff Gorman was considered-he would have been very good.

Another forgotten comedy of his: "What's Up Tiger Lily" from 1966. Decades before MST3K, he took a Japanese spy movie and re-dubbed it. It was hilarious. Very hard to find now.

I've never seen any of What's New Pussycat? the first movie he wrote and acts in. I don't think I've ever even seen a clip of it. There must be some weird rights issues with it.

I think they wanted Warren Beatty to be in it, but settled for Peter O'Toole. Peter Sellers is on it as well. I'm very curious to see it Woody says it's a complete disaster

I watched Manhattan on TCM last night. Can you imagine making a movie today where a middle aged man is dating a 17 year old high school student and his friends are cool with it?

Nope, R204. Wasn’t it considered statutory rape even back then?

Watched "Another Woman" for the first time last night, thanks to this thread. What a great movie, centered by Rowlands' wonderful performance. I got unexpected chills when the film ended. Such a slow, low burn.

Lots of great supporting roles as well, especially Sandy Dennis. I was sad to see on her Wiki that she died only a couple years after this film was made.

"Wild Strawberries" is one of my least favorite Bergman films, so I expected to not love this one as much as I did. Also, wow, Gene Hackman is a terrible kisser.

"I accept your condemnation."

R206. Betty Buckley is incredible in that one small scene.

Another Woman is still streaming on Prime. Interiors isn’t, sadly.

I adore Maureen Stapleton in Interiors. This dreary miserable WASP family. Then Pearl (Stapleton) shows up. She's a delightful life force. She wears red. Mary Beth Hurt calls her a vulgarian to her face. The mother commits suicide, and MB Hurt damn near dies trying to stop her. But in the end, it's the wonderful, warm, life giving Pearl who saves Hurt. So, Pearl IS life, whereas the mother, who was walking death, is now actually dead.

Imagine being the Mary Beth Hurt character (Joey) and thinking the way that YOU are is the right way to be, and the way that Pearl is is the wrong way. She should be thrilled to be away from that dreary neurotic woman who was her mother.

It's interesting- it's a recurring thing in Woody movies. A group of intellectuals looking down on someone who believes in Tarot cards or astrology.

Such a family of cunts in Interiors. The only character I liked was Joey's boyfriend, who takes to Maureen immediately. Even pompous Frederick likes her.

"The idea that their work will live on is the artist's Catholicism." LOL He is so great.

What's surprising is the hopeful ending. Expectations are completely subverted, because usually movies like Interiors wind up pretty bleak. Of course, we don't know for sure, but at least we know that now Joey and Renata have a chance at happiness.

[quote]It's interesting- it's a recurring thing in Woody movies. A group of intellectuals looking down on someone who believes in Tarot cards or astrology.

Yes. One of the best scenes in Husbands and Wives (a movie with more than a few great scenes) is Sydney Pollack taking Lysette Anthony, the young aerobics instructor for whom he left Judy Davis, to a party. The other guests are all his peers in age and career type, the set he and Davis mixed easily with. We know it's going to go badly, and we're right.

I remember Anthony saying in 1992 that she thought she would play her character as a "wounded angel" being picked apart by the upper-crust snobs for her belief in astrology, and Allen made her do it over. He wanted her to be combative. He wanted the scene to be ugly rather than poignant. I think that direction made it better. She gets bitchy in return. Then when Pollack is literally dragging her to the car, she's really fighting him.

Lysette Anthony has gone on record on saying that Harvey Weinstein raped her.

I love this line from INTERIORS:

“I’m not in the mood for your LESBIAN friends and a lot of vacuous gossip about New York poetry.”

Joey (Mary Beth Hurt) in INTERIORS:

“How can we have a kid right now? I don’t even know where MY life is going.”

She really should have been nominated.

In Interiors, Diane Keaton's husband gives off SUCH creep vibes. Richard Jordan was the actor.

I'm curious as to how his attempted sexual assault of the Flyn character really fits into the theme they were going for.

Renata was probably frigid and the actress sister was hot to trot, wasn’t she?

That's true. I just don't see how it fits with the mother killing herself. I guess Renata has been impacted by the mother as well, just not as much as Joey. Flyn escaped the family to Los Angeles, so she's mentally healthier.

"Your work is not fashionable, Frederick, and you should be THANKFUL for that, for God's sake!!! We've always talked about FINE work, that means something in the long run. I mean, what are you after? The superficial acclaim of some little book reviewer in a little room somewhere?"

[italic]I want to speak to Miriam!

[quote] it is funny how directors will shoehorn in their fetishes.

And once you find out about the director's fetish, you can't stop seeing it. I can't believe how many closeups of hot chick feet there are in the Tarantino movies that I never really noticed before.

As for Woody, there was a similar scene in Manhattan of middle-aged guy going to old movies with young girl. That's the first thing I thought of when I re-watched C&M a few weeks ago (inspired by this thread) and saw the Cliff and niece scene. A couple of shots of Dylan in the wedding scene too.

[quote]Flyn escaped the family to Los Angeles, so she's mentally healthier.

Escape may not be all there is to it. Beautiful Hollywood actress Flyn is the shallowest of the three sisters, this movie's equivalent to Liv Ullmann in Cries and Whispers.

A belief that those who don't probe too deeply are more content with their lot in life, and maybe to be envied in some way, is something else that comes back over and over in Allen's films. In Annie Hall, it's played for laughs with the happy couple Alvy meets in the street. "I'm very shallow and empty, and I have no ideas and nothing interesting to say." "And I'm exactly the same way."

I hate the name Renata so much. Meanwhile, Miriam was a perfect name for Claire Bloom's character.

Renata is a very Germanic name.

[italic][bold] I WANT to speak to MIRIAM!

I think I conflated Interiors and Crimes characters above. I'm red faced. We need a damn editvbutton.

Works for me.

We were robbed of a Delores/Miriam confrontation. Anjelica and Claire Bloom, what a ferocious combination. I thought no one could be scarier than Anjel in The Witches and then I saw Claire Bloom in Brideshead Revisited!

Claire Bloom as the Maltese villainess Orlena on As The World Turns was also scary.

Interesting review of the documentary Roger & Me by Jonathan Rosenbaum, which includes a discussion of the film’s affinities with Crimes & Misdemeanors and Batman. Discussion of C&D starts around 2/3 of the way down.

All of Woody's movies deal with coveting inlaws, being chummy with young girls, and worrying about sin and death.

If only she could have spoken to Miriam...

[quote] one looks back at his body of work, and considers what we now know about him, many of his "masterpieces" are considerably less so. I used to love Manhattan, I can hardly watch it now.

Yet as Mia's hysterical smear campaign fades into the past Woody's films endure.

Huge Woody fan, but Crimes and Misdemeanors doesn't do it for me. It's fine and all, but the reviews really surprised me. I didn't think it was as good as everyone else thought it was.

Now, "Another Woman" on the other hand is still not appreciated enough in my opinion.

The thinking man's Fatal Attraction. I think its brilliant.

I WANT TO SPEAK TO MIRIAM!

"The last time I was inside a woman was my visit to the Statue of Liberty."

definitely Allens' best serious film to date

Martin Landau's character is really risking everything and going to extremes to get rid of his mistress. Wouldn't fessing up to his wife be a lot less complicated, dangerous and have far fewer potential consequences?

My favorite Allen movie is The Purple Rose of Cairo

I love that one too

[quote] Wouldn't fessing up to his wife be a lot less complicated, dangerous and have far fewer potential consequences?

Bitch, you think Dolores is scary?

R242 I think he'd seen his brother get away with some pretty serious stuff. And he knew his chances of getting caught were very slim, considering it was a one time only thing.

It IS an interesting question to ponder. If you do a horrible thing, and no one knows you did it, what ARE the implications/consequences? Unless you believe in heaven and hell, and you have no conscience about it, you're home free.

It's very interesting that the Woodman had this as a main theme in 3 or 4 different movies. Essentially "I cant believe I got away with it!"

R244 going to jail losing, everything and having to live in fear of being found out are scarier than Delores let me tell you

You could say Delores was put out of her misery, like a sick animal. She had no life. The reason she was hellbent on telling Miriam everything was because she had nothing left. Maybe deep down Judah knew that she wouldn't be missed by anyone and that's how he comes to terms with what he did in the end.

I think you nailed Dolores. She was an over the hill flight attendant with no prospects. Doesn’t she mention that she turned down “other opportunities” to commit to Judah. That was bullshit. There were no “other opportunities.”

By why would Juda nail Dolores R248?

(^.^) Judah

R247 so Judah was a psychotic coward who rationalized that killing someone was an act of mercy and conveniently that someone who might bring disorder to his life. Kinda like killing 2 birds with 1 stone

He had her killed. One person in the world knew he did it, his brother, and he certainty wasn't going to tell anyone. His other brother, the Rabbi, went blind. Judah lived out his life, likely died without anyone ever knowing. You wonder, did he have that vision of her lying on the ground, dead looking in his direction, on in his head often? Or was he able to shunt it aside, and convince himself it never happened?

I was once involved in a accident where I thought someone might die. Thank GOD that didn't happen. The person was fine. But boy, I was contemplating the crushing guilt I would feel, and suicide seemed like a reasonable solution, if it came down to it.

So I don't think I'm like Judah. I dont think I could walk away. A friend of mine had a friend who died. He was given drugs by a hookup. My friend met with the hookup to ask him how everything happened. About a month later, the hookup killed himself over it.

I denied business opportunities! For you!

Don't trick me, Judah! I bought you a birthday present. I know how much you love Schubert.

I read Allen's book. I totally believe his side of the "Dylan" story. I think Mia is a woman scorned and Dylan a demented pawn.

Yeah. I don't think Allen has conducted a blameless life, and there are unappealing aspects to his personality, but I've always felt that the Woody/Soon-Yi/Moses side of that family feud made their case much more logically and plausibly than the Mia/Ronan/Dylan side.

The accusations against Woody were made during the era of child abuse hysteria following the McMartin Preschool scandal. The child protective services and prosecutors would have loved to make an example of a celebrity like. Woody.

Had there been an actual basis getting his scalp would have made them famous.. That they closed out the complaint always satisfied me there simply was no case.

I, too, believe him innocent, if only at that accusation.

On another note, is there a single gay man in any of his 143 movies?

[quote] On another note, is there a single gay man in any of his 143 movies?

Yes

More substantially, he has a gay couple in Whatever Works, the one with Larry David and Evan Rachel Wood.

Oh, and Dianne Wiest's handsome, "grieving" boyfriend in Radio Days. Considering both the time the movie was made and the time it was set, the revelation is handled sensitively.

Yeah he revisits these themes a lot. Even though Match Point is a skillfully made, and JRM is delicious in it, it is such an obvious retread of Crimes & Misdemeanors, which remains the better film.

I agree

[QUOTE] His other brother, the Rabbi, went blind

The rabbi character, played by Sam Waterston, was not Judah’s brother in the film. He was the brother of Joanna Gleason.

I agree. Mia Farrow left Woody a note when he arrived that day. It said something along the lines of "Woody (had sex with) the 18 year old. Is the 5 year old next?" Again, he came for his visit, and Mia LEFT THAT NOTE FOR HIM! And then supposedly, after getting that note, he spirited Dylan away to the attic. The one and only time in his life he ever did it. Plus Moses was there that day, and he says it didn't happen.

I think it's very important to take all accusations seriously. But this one didn't happen.

That Radio Days scene with Dianne Wiest is not only sensitive but brilliant in its realism.

You can see it starting to unfold when Wiest's date gives the ex-partner's name as Leonard, but it's not the cue for humor, though the film is basically a comedy. Instead, we see the suffering of the gay man on his own terms, and Wiest wrestling with this news as she absorbs what it means.

The setting is c. 1943, yet the scene could have unfolded yesterday, and probably with greater sympathy for both characters than someone today might have.

It's a superb film, because the comedy is cut with some difficult naturalism--as when the nation is transfixed by the rescue of the little girl who fell down a well.

Only she dies before they can bring her up. It's heartrending.

I just screened the movie two days ago--Prime has it up for free. I hadn't seen it in many years, and I was shocked at how well it skates between spoof and enlightenment.

And that really is a great gay scene.

The hat...

Watched it yesterday, did anyone catch Frances Conroy in a tiny role showing Judah’s childhood home to him?

“Judah, I gave up business opportunities for you. Business Opportunities!”

I want to speak to MIRIAM

[quote]You can see it starting to unfold when Wiest's date gives the ex-partner's name as Leonard, but it's not the cue for humor, though the film is basically a comedy. Instead, we see the suffering of the gay man on his own terms, and Wiest wrestling with this news as she absorbs what it means.

When she says he never told her that the love he's been mourning was named "Leonard," he says, through tears, "How could I?" It isn't just having lost someone that's so painful; it's having to be secretive and coded about it. Maybe not even having much of a network of friends.

Robert Joy was great as Fred, as was Wiest, reacting in ways that make sense for Bea. I think of that scene when I hear the song that's playing on the radio, which sets him off (I'm Getting Sentimental Over You).

Peak Woody was so good.

Nice to read the love for "Radio Days". Over the years it has become my favorite Woody Allen movie. Th ensemble is wonderful, the stories very funny but as pointed out above, often moving. The soundtrack is great and what an ending... melancholy is that Woody Allen manner that is actually moving.

What are the best soundtracks from Woody Allen movies? I have the soundtracks for Radio Days, Hannah and Manhattan (George Gershwin).

I'm more into Prokofiev than his New Orleans Jazz

R274: my favorite is Hannah, I have it on original vinyl.

Funny that Wood dislikes Hannah. I suppose it's too warm and ultimately uplifting for him.

My three faves would be 1. Match Point, 2. Hannah, 3. Crimes.

Husbands & Wives always wins for me, but C&M is creeping into the top 10 now cuz of this thread. Great picks R277

Woody wanted Jack Nicholson for the Michael Caine role in Hannah and Her Sisters but Nicholson was unavailable and the role went to Caine.

Didn’t Hannah originally have a darker ending but the studio persuaded Woody to reshoot and end with a happier scene between Woody and Wiest?

I remember thinking at the end of "Hannah and Her Sisters" that Holly must have been impregnated by someone other than Mickey (who was supposedly impotent), so it didn't seem that happy.

someone mentioned Whatever Works upthread a film I've never heard of just like Rifkin's Festival, A Rainy Day in New York, To Rome with Love, Irrational Man, Wonder Wheel, Cafe Society, Magic in the Moonlight, Casandra's Dream, You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, Scoop, Match point, Anything Else, Hollywood Ending . . .how do his films get financed? His filmography on IMDB for the last 2 decades barely contains a single film I've heard of let alone seen!

R280 is there a single black or Hispanic character of any significance in any of the movies he wrote and/or directed? There was a black character in The Purple Rose of Cairo playing a maid in the movie within the movie.

There are no black or latinX people in Manhattan

(^.^) my thoughts exactly since many of Woody's films are set in NYC

R283

Team Mia/Dylan/Ronan.

(But I still enjoy Woody's films with Diane Keaton & Mia).

I forgot to add “Alice” to my list. Very whimsical and charming, and that’s all thanks to Mia. I don’t know if it’s an unpopular opinion especially on here, but I think she was something special in Woody’s movies, really elevated them.

Hazelle Goodman played a prominent and very funny black character in “deconstructing Harry” though some might object to the fact that it was a hooker.

Chiwetel Ejiofor (later the 12 Years a Slave lead) had a prominent role in Melinda and Melinda too.

[quote]Didn’t Hannah originally have a darker ending but the studio persuaded Woody to reshoot and end with a happier scene between Woody and Wiest?

No. Allen is the first to say he's led a charmed life artistically. Except for VERY early (e.g. What's New, Pussycat?) he's made his movies the way he wanted at the time. He's had supportive producers, and interference from studios has never really been an issue. Harvey Weinstein (as distributor, not producer) tried to get him to take the one "motherfucker" out of Everyone Says I Love You so it could play at Radio City Music Hall, and Allen wouldn't do it.

But he has expressed his own dissatisfaction with the ending of Hannah. He has said he considered writing it with more of a suggestion that Elliot (Michael Caine) was still in love with Lee (Barbara Hershey), instead of what he went with.

[quote]I remember thinking at the end of "Hannah and Her Sisters" that Holly must have been impregnated by someone other than Mickey (who was supposedly impotent), so it didn't seem that happy.

Mickey and Hannah are told Mickey may be sterile (rather than impotent)...as I think real-life Allen believed himself to be in 1985-86. And he actually may have been, given that his only biological child of record if Ronan, and there's a question mark even over him.

I took the Mickey/Holly ending at face value, as a delightful surprise for them. It fits with the film's overall outlook. Several characters are neurotic and always getting in their own way, and they have more potential for happiness than they realize.

It's both a very characteristic Woody Allen film and an uncharacteristic one. He would not have made the same way five years earlier or five years later.

I agree

Jennifer Tilly has a black maid in Bullets over Broadway.

I’d like to see a remake of Interiors with an all Black cast. Would Viola Davis play the Geraldine Page or Maureen Stapleton role?

Viola in the Geraldine Page role; Halle in the Maureen Stapleton role. Denzel as the EG Marshall character.

[quote]Mickey and Hannah are told Mickey may be sterile (rather than impotent)...as I think real-life Allen believed himself to be in 1985-86.

Thanks for the correction.Sterile, not impotent.

Whatever Works is hilarious. Larry David and Patricia Clarkson are great and who knew Evan Rachel Wood could be funny.

Another Alice fan here. Mia is charming and Woody surrounded her with a great cast (some in very tiny roles).

A pre-Seinfeld Larry David played small roles in Radio Days (the Communist neighbor who half-indoctrinates Uncle Abe) and New York Stories: Oedipus Wrecks (the theater manager helping to search after the mother vanishes).

If he hadn't co-created a monster hit sitcom, he might have had a successful career as a comedic character actor.

The NYT did a quarantine piece on him in the early pandemic period in 2020, and he said he was reading Apropos of Nothing.

All of his financing comes from Europe for the last 20-odd years, hence why he shot movies in the UK, France and Spain. All the actors get paid scale, I think the biggest budget item is Allen’s right to do re-shoots, even if it means recasting and re-doing the entire movie. Cate Blanchett had to beg Chanel for two jackets to use in Blue Jasmine (one new for flashbacks in NYC, one rumpled for present day in SF).

I don’t get the love here for Another Woman. I tried watching it again last night. I adored Rowlands in Gloria but she’s listless and dull in this film. Ian Holm is totally wrong as an American. And he’s brilliant in everything else. Gene Hackman? No. Betty Buckley is strikingly good but that’s it. It’s dramatically inert.

I forgot to mention that Blythe Danner is also pretty good in one particular scene (the one in the kitchen with Rowlands and Holm)

R283 There's that giant colored chamber maid.

Was it the Schumann or the Schubert?

Loved the soundtrack for this one too.

R302 Schubert String Quartet No. 15

Schumann is flowery

Marion is a dull, listless woman surrounded by much more interesting people. She’s an academic. Dry. Boring. I love the scene where her sister in law tells Marion that her brother hates her. Frances Conroy just relishes knocking Marion down a peg. I think Rowlands plays her perfectly.

I read somewhere (a biography maybe) that Manhattan Murder Mystery was originally a sub-plot that was cut from the Annie Hall script. Makes sense because both movies were co-writen by the same guy.

HEY. Look at me and not her, goddammit.

I thought it was inspired to cast Rowlands as such a controlled, cerebral, "correct" character. I'd never have thought of her for it, but I believe her in every moment of it.

I can understand the mixed reviews this had in 1988 and see why it's not everyone's cup of tea now (Woody's Wild Strawberries with Rowlands as the She-Borg. and dialogue that sounds influenced by subtitles), but I've always been a fan. There are so many great moments. Martha Plimpton as the stepdaughter has a great peeved expression when Marion turns away after she's chastised her for bringing up the John Houseman character's age. Marion thinks they've smoothed that over and moved on, but the girl still has has some resentment. Marion has left a lot of that in her wake.

R308 I don’t like any of Woody’s straight dramas. He wanted to be Bergman so badly which he wasn’t, and that’s ok - his best work is actually much better.

But he would say this faux self-deprecating crap like “comedy doesn’t mean anything,” and my movies would be so much better if I didn’t feel the need to add in the comedy, and It’s like shut the fuck up. It’s the expert juxtaposition that makes his best movies so great.

Most of Allen's 'serious' film are suffocatingly flat i.e. September, Interiors, Another Woman . . . and much of his seriocomic works are as well Manhattan Murder Mystery. Stardust Memories . . .

. . .it's also flat and peak less. It doesn't conclude so much as stop. There's nothing to take home but your feet. -Washington Post review of Shadow and Fog

[quote] There's nothing to take home but your feet. -Washington Post review of Shadow and Fog

The film is a homage and tribute to German Expressionist cinema, particularly the works of German filmmakers F.W. Murnau, Georg Wilhelm Pabst and Fritz Lang. Specific individual works of these directors which inspired the film were Murnau's Nosferatu (1922), Pabst's The Joyless Street (1925) and Pandora's Box (1929) , and Lang's M (1931).

Naturally it would go over the head of Washington Post philistines

"If you’re going to steal, steal from the best.” – Woody Allen

R311 actually the Washington Post noted what you said but instead of being impressed by the associations and 'borrowings' felt like Vincent Canby in his NY Times review of the pretentious and lifeless Interiors 'it's almost as if Mr. Allen set out to make someone Else's movie . . .without having any grasp of the material, or first-hand, gut feelings for the characters. AMEN

R312 Apparently, Allen was so determined to ape Chekhov's Three Sisters that he gives the 3rd sister in Interiors (ACTRESS) nothing to do except sniff some coke in a car in the garage that you forget that she's even in the movie. Allen doesn't know what to do with what he borrowed except impress culture vultures with the references and associations.

If r283 lives in the present he/they know that ONLY people of color are allowed to write roles for people of color!

Where have I heard STAY IN YOUR LANE so often? Oh yeah, Gen Z and Millennial woke virtue signallers!

The strangest case is "Stardust Memories" and "8 1/2." If they had been novelists, Fellini could have sued for plagiarism.

[quote]Marion is a dull, listless woman

Marion is a pensive, thoughtful woman

Honestly, it's like some of you can't tolerate a superb character study. Oh, and if Gene Hackman was this good in another film, I've yet to see it. He's incredible. I think it is a gripping 88 minutes, or however length it is!

I also think anyone who doesn't appreciate the borderline brilliant "Manhattan Murder Mystery" has a screw loose!

R316 I can tolerate a superb character study but none of Woody's film would qualify and isn't MMM where he grifted, I mean grafted Welles' The Lady from Shanghai?

R315 Allen is guilty Gilt by association

CELEBRITY is all over the place but it’s never boring.

Now, I do love the best of Woody, but better than Bergman? Naw. I'd say they both had their hits and misses, but Bergman's highs were higher than Woody's highs.

I want to talk to MARION!

How did we get from Woody Allen comedy to Adam Sandler retarded idiocy. And Judd Apatow;s sloppy, overly improvised garbage.

r315, yeah, stardust is sort of a reimagine of the very same film

Gena Rowlands is so limited and blah to watch. If he had cast Vanessa Redgrave in Another Woman, the whole thing might actually move me.

Great idea, R324. And her character and Ian Holm’s should both have been Brits who are long time residents of NYC.

Was Stockard Channing never in a Woody Allen film? You’d think she’d be perfect.

M could have played Marion, with G in the Sandy Dennis role.

Why did Woody and Tony Roberts stop working together?

R299, I am with you. I suspect that Allen (despite his reputation) really has not spent much time around intellectuals, becuase the dialog in Another Woman is so stilted and the character's behavior is so un-lifelike. His films are usually so well observed. In Another Woman he is writing the idea of what he thinks these people are like rather than who they really are.

The thing about his films is that the characters all seem so intelligent and quick. But when he is writing about the intellectuals in this film they are stiff, slow, and have no sense of humor

I also think Glenda Jackson might have been a more interesting Marion. Glenda is rather like the precursor to Judy Davis, after all.

WTF? When/why was it re-titled?

The line delivery is actually, "I want to SPEAK to MIRIAM." It's her problem too!!!!

We need a poll: "I want to SPEAK to MIRIAM!" or "It was an ABORTION, Michael!"

I want to speak to MIRIAM and MARION! Now, Judah. Now!

I'm not going to let this happen to me again! I'm not going to give up without a fight!!!!

r325 Stockard Channing was in at least one of Woody's movies - ANYTHING ELSE (the one with Jason Biggs and Christina Ricci). For me, that one has always been the nadir of the Allen oeuvre - and he was making lotsa bad movies around that time, so that's really saying something. Channing doesn't help and is miscast.

R324, I remember when “Celebrity” was in production, Vanessa Redgrave was listed as in the cast, but when the film was released, she was nowhere to be found. Woody Allen ended up replacing Redgrave with Bebe Neuwirth.

she's a marvel

I need to revisit Celebrity. I saw it at the time and thought it was disjointed, nerve-racking, not much of any real significance to say. Yes, fame is crazy, we get it. Maybe it'll hit different now, as the kids say.

The best part of Celebrity is, shockingly, Leonardo Di Caprio; the movie's energy doesn't recover when his character leaves.

I think Allen actually re-cast Stritchy in the Redgrave part in CELEBRITY but wound up replacing both of them with the Bebe Neuwirth character.

[quote] replacing both of them with the Bebe Neuwirth character.

Good move. Bebe had better feet

It occurred to me that Crimes was filmed around the time Soon-Yi was 16, and Woody started taking her to Knicks games and stuff, with Mia's blessing. I think that might be where the going to movies with his niece thing comes from.

I went and watched the trailer to Celebrity, and it's as awful as I remember the movie being. I get that the premise is as a society we're too obsessed with stupid celebrities, but you kind of have to care about stupid celebrities to even buy the premise.

R342 Soon-Yi was 18 in 1988 when C&D was in production. He didn’t take her to a Knicks game until 1990, right after she turned 20.

[quote]I need to revisit Celebrity. I saw it at the time and thought it was disjointed, nerve-racking, not much of any real significance to say. Yes, fame is crazy, we get it. Maybe it'll hit different now, as the kids say.

I haven't seen it since it was new either, and I felt the same about it. As usual for an Allen film of that time, there were talented and interesting people in the cast, but it had no rhythm and seemed to drag, feeling longer than it was. It was also an early sighting of two things that marked Allen's decline as a screenwriter: very specific repetition (the recycling of the "polymorphously perverse" bit from AH) and seeming out of touch with the modern culture the film is trying to satirize.

I agree with R339 that the DiCaprio section is the highlight. I remember four young women a couple aisles in front of me at the theater getting up and walking out when his part was done. That was at the peak of Leomania, that first year following Titanic.

Celebrity was the last of Bergman DP Sven Nykvist's four films with Allen, a decade following their consecutive trio of Another Woman, NY Stories, and C&M, and one of his last films overall. The neurologic condition that forced his retirement was diagnosed that year.

Didn't Nykvist's condition inspire the plot of HOLLYWOOD ENDING?

I WANT TO TALK TO CHLOE!

R347 Omg you're right!

“You told me over and over again you’d leave Miriam. We made plans!”

"You've got to tell Chloe! If you don't, I will!"

Forgotten gem: “Sweet and Lowdown”. Samantha Morton and Sean Penn. A masterpiece.

I liked Sweet and Lowdown but I thought the mockumentary format was a mistake. It kept taking me out of the movie.

Husbands and Wives is even better than Crimes and Misdemeanours. Judy Davis' character: "I did my college thesis on German architecture of the 1930s. It was called "Function and Fascism." This was years ago at Radcliffe."

"I brought you a present, Judah! I know how much you love Schubert!!!!"

I remember being annoyed by Woody and Mia’s characters kvelling over Indian take-out.

[quote]Gena Rowlands is so limited and blah to watch. If he had cast Vanessa Redgrave in Another Woman, the whole thing might actually move me.

This might be the worst take I've ever read on DL.

Where is this available for streaming

It must be remembered that many people believe that Woody Allen sexually assaulted a child and that's not right!

(Sun-Yi has an IQ below 10)

R355 Mia actually does a fair amount of eating in the film. They've got cheeseburgers in the movie theater. Then some kind of danish in Woody's office. Then champagne.

R357 It's not available at the moment. I got a DVD from the library, which I've discovered/remembered is a great resource for films that aren't streaming.

The only problem with old DVDs from the library is that oftentimes they are horribly scratched or otherwise don't work for whatever reason. No one reports this, so they just go back into circulation.

R360 True but I've been having great luck with them recently, probably because I check out obscure films few are really interested in. Mine is the Los Angeles county system, so there's a wide selection.

Charlize's weird bangs and Kenneth Branagh's poor man's Woody Allen impression acting in Celebrity were way more annoying R355.

I remember seeing Husbands and Wives when it came out. It was the height of the Woody-Mia scandal, and I was struck by how jerky and fraught the camera work was. You could really sense the strain in Mia, she clearly was no longer an object of Woody's affection. The overall effect was disturbing, I didn't like the movie.

I consider Husbands and Wives one of his masterpieces. But a lot of people did complain about the shaky-cam. I think he wanted a ragged effect for this movie, with its pseudo-documentary framing and its unsettled emotions. Typically, the camerawork in his movies was very smooth.

The breakup scene for Mia's character and Woody's is among Mia's best work. I don't have a lot good to say about her these days, but I'll give her that. In what had to be difficult circumstances, she fulfilled her commitment, and she probably drew on real-life emotion...although her character is more resigned and drained than angry. ("Don't do that. It's over and we both know it. You know, all those memories, they're just memories. They're from years gone by. They're just isolated moments that don't tell the whole story.")

I believe that scene was shot not long after she found the notorious photographs.

But it's Judy Davis's triumph more than anyone else's. That scene in which she's yelling at her estranged husband on the phone while her opera date sheepishly waits in the living room...it was like the '90s were going to have their own Bette Davis.

R364, Allen wanted Farrow to play the Judy Davis part. She asked to play the other part.

^^^the point being that Allen wanted Farrow to have the bigger flashier part and she opted to play the betrayed wife.

I heard the reason was that she wanted a smaller part with less shooting time.

Mia's character in H&W isn't a betrayed wife. They separate over other things. It's Davis whose husband leaves her for a young airhead.

R367, my memory on the plot may be faulty. But I checked and the Davis role was indeed written for Farrow.

She always tended to opt for the smallest parts. She was given the choice of any of the sisters in Hannah and her sisters, and chose the smallest, least dramatic sister to play.

The role Farrow played in H&W was famously offered to Jane Fonda.

Mia also played a smaller role in Another Woman (which, I’m sorry, IS one of Allen’s masterpieces).

I would love to have seen Jane in a Woody movie. She wasn't, was she? Seems like everybody and their uncle has a Woody film on their resume at this point.

Mia’s best work was in Broadway Danny Rose. I remember seeing it in a theatre and close to the end of the movie a woman screamed THAT’S MIA FARROW?????? The entire audience cracked up and applauded.

Judy Davis is more talented than Bette Davis. And Cate Blanchett completely copied her.

You can see it here. Just have adblocker installed on your browser before opening.

R364 I remember a scene of them walking in NYC, and she kinda stumbles off the crosswalk. She seems absolutely catatonic in that scene. Like on tons of xanax, and no sleep at all.

Over her career Judy Davis hasn't received a fraction of the recognition she earned.

Maybe she should have installed pumpkin sized fake books too.

When Woody's character tells his wife (Joanna Gleason, right?) that his sister went through a horrific ordeal -- to which you could have winced or laughed at and either would be appropriate -- she just rolls over says I gotta get up early tomorrow.

That sums up right there why I'd rather be alone than with an asshole.

I found "Husbands and Wives" to be torture, just straight couples bickering the whole time. I didn't care for it at all, but married people seem to love it.

R375 Judy Davis has been nominated for two Oscars, won two Golden Globes and two Emmy Awards, not to mention the various Film Critics Societies and Australian awards she's racked up--not too shabby for someone who was mostly a theater actress for so long. I wish there were recordings of her Romeo & Juliet with Mel Gibson from the late '70s...

Yet how many of the general public have a clue who she is, while nearly all know Meghan Fox or Emma Watson

R375, I never get these kinds of posts. Davis has won numerous awards and is frequently cited as one the the best film actors around. Even the general public recognizes the quality of her work as you see here on DL and on many other forums where actors are discussed.

What more do you expect? Do you really think she could win the Nobel Peace Prize?

I think R375 would like Davis to be as well known and respected by people on the street as, say, Meryl Streep and Glenn Close are. But her relatively low name recognition is in part a byproduct of the kind of work that intrigues her. When your great performances have been in movies like Barton Fink, Husbands and Wives, and The New Age, your work is going to be SEEN, but you won't have the kind of fan following you'll have if you book a Fatal Attraction or a Devil Wears Prada once in a while. She never really has.

Her television work has probably been her most widely seen in America. She was Judy Garland and Nancy Reagan. But it's the rare TV movie that has a long lifespan.

Davis is always good in these unsympathetic roles. It's too bad Allen didn't cast someone else as Hannah---Farrow's stereotypical waifishness makes it the least interesting character in the film. It would have been a great part for Sandy Dennis, if she could underplay some of her tics.

Farrow did nail the passive-aggressiveness in the shopping scene with Holly/Wiest, in which the latter wants to borrow more money because now she's going to give musical theater a try (the catering thing having come and gone).

That's a great scene, because they both have a point. Hannah has a way of undermining the people around her without seeming to, and then denying that that was her intention. (She's a cousin to Marion in Another Woman.) But, as we subsequently see, Holly really ISN'T a very good singer, and she's just setting herself up for more disappointment.

R381, but that would be wishing she were more famous. "Recognition" in this context usually mean acclaim--which Davis is not lacking--even among the general public.

What you are describing is "fame" which is something different.

And even there, she is about as famous as a character actress ever gets.

R383: I thought that was a cringeworthy scene, because Mia had to tell us what was up with her rather than showing us. Part of the problem is the script, but a better neurotic would have made me buy it and care more about her one way or the other. Instead. No one respects her but I really could have cared less about her character.

This thread is making me think about how much Allen really tried to push Farrow as an actress.

When you look at everything he wrote for her, from the cartoon in Radio Days, to Alice, to Broadeway Danny Rose, to the Judy Davis role in Husbands and Wives.

He kept trying to move her beyond any one persona. But she seemed to resist that, gravitating to the more mousy roles. She was great in them because she is a terrific actress. But she wanted to stay in her lane.

That scene is so good. I love how the camera just keeps circling. Does anyone know what restaurant that was? Barbara Seagull still sexy with the world's worst perm.

I still use Holly's line "You always undercut my enthusiasm!"

R386: The real problem is that she isn't much of an actress, although I liked her in Radio Days.

I think is is a terrific actress. But a lazy one. She just did not care much about acting.

Her best role by far was on the witness stand...

Hannah is the least interesting sister but the most successful. Career as an actress that she put on hold, successful husband, great apartment and kids. I love the scene where she mediates an ugly fight between her parents and the brilliant Lloyd Nolan says in anger that he’s not sure if Hannah is his and Mia just calmly ignores the hurtful remark and focuses on making everything better. That scene says everything about who Hannah is and her role in the family.

Mia Farrow is a psychopath. Woody found her soullessness and self-servingness fascinating as a writer and director, and he ultimately paid the price.

[quote]Meryl Streep, during her Emmy Award acceptance speech for Angels in America, stated that "No one has put a better performance on film than Judy Davis in 'Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows.'"

R393 She really said that? I agree, Judy as Judy was phenomenal. The scene where she's been up for 24 hours and is backstage revving herself up to step onstage at Carnegie Hall gave me chills!

I love that lunch scene from "Hannah", all three actresses are really superb and it is a great scene about how actual people talk and express themselves. I think the whole movie holds up beautifully.

Can somebody explain to me why they think Gena Rowlands' performance as Marion is a good one? There was a potentially great character there and she sleepwalked through it.

She just looks uncomfortable. She knows she’s miscast as a brittle academic. She’s much more suited to play a “broad.”

R386 Whilst the Allen/Farrow collaborations were generally widely acclaimed in the 1980s/very early 90s and most of the films remain classics they were distractors.

I remember one critic (can't remember the name) from the UK who hated The Purple Rose of Cairo and complained some like "Mia's performance was basically Sissy Spacek channelling Lillian Gish but that was obviously what Woody wanted".

I get that assessment with The Purple Rose of Cairo and probably A Midsummer Nights Sex Comedy & Zelig but it certainly was not the case in Broadway Danny Rose.

And most of what came after Purple Rose too.

R391 Mia is wonderful in that scene. At the end the camera gets very close as her face conveys so must wistful emotion and regret, while "You Are Too Beautiful" plays. Kills me!

Judy Davis was great in Ratched. Just wish Winslet had done it instead of Paulson. She’s so TV.

The creepy valentine Mia sent Woody with the steak knife plunged through the photo of her and the adopted children, with Soon-Yi's image on the base of the knife, is a glimpse into the mind of a true psychopath. She framed him.

Woody is one of the if not the only male actor/hollywood person even the DL agrees on being straight-straight R390 😂

R401 I thought it was very creative.

R403 Very Catholic. Hey, both Woody and Mia expressed their neuroses through their art!

“I want her to know the kind of man she’s married to… I want to speak to Miriam! I’m not going to let this happen to me again!”

"I'm having a heavy day"

I agree with many here that nothing he has done since this film compares in quality. Nothing since then is really even memorable or important. Some later films were passably entertaining at most.

Whether this is his best movie I think is more debatable, -I still love Annie Hall- but if I were introducing someone to his films I would say see a couple of the zany early ones, Annie Hall, Manhattan, Zelig and this. That's still a great run.

I just reread this thread. Wow. Great discussion!

I also wanted to point out the similarities between C&M and Network. Here, it is Landau and Huston, in Network it is Holden and Dunaway.

Claire Bloom, who played Miriam Rosenthal in Crimes and Misdemeanors, played Gertude in 1980's Hamlet, Prince of Denmark along with Derek Jacobi as Hamlet, Patrick Stewart as Claudius and Eric Porter as Polonius.

In addition, in 1972's Antony and Cleopatra, Eric Porter plays Enobarbus, a character roughly corresponding to Martin Landau's Rufio in Cleopatra (1963). Landau played Judah Rosenthal in Crimes and Misdemeanors, husband of Bloom's character.

It is Crimes and Misdemeanors!

[quote]Can somebody explain to me why they think Gena Rowlands' performance as Marion is a good one? There was a potentially great character there and she sleepwalked through it.

I've never heard anyone who didn't see Gena Rowlands' thoughtful, restrained and compelling performance in "Another Woman" as "sleepwalking"! I'm astounded to hear that's your take on it, but it's a free country!

I saw something completely different in the many times I've seen the film. Marion is a college professor who has completely intellectualized the trauma in her life under the delusion that she has been wisely managing her most troubling circumstances. Then she overhears Mia Farrow's character describing who she really is, and suddenly Marion sees herself clearly through Mia's unprejudiced prism of her. Suddenly Marion has a new vantagepoint on her life. I find Gena's performance totally original as well as sympathetic, which was very difficult in such a flawed, non-cuddly character, but we must believe in and like Marion and feel for her throughout.

i worked background for a week in the wedding sequence.

Willian Freidkin, who I love, said this film was BRILLIANT. One of his favorites.

I personally love Annie Hall, Interiors, Manhattan, Hannah-

And my latest favorite- Another Woman- Just a perfect film.

R130, check out Claire Bloom playing the mother of Doc Martin. Full-on cunt mode, and it doesn’t seem like a stretch.

How has no one included “What’s Up Tiger Lily?” as one of his greatest films?

I kid, I kid. But as a youngster that movie gave me great pleasure.

R136, I always feel relief when Joe Pesci’s character in “Goodfellas” is killed. They’re all menacing psychopaths but Pesci is complete chaos.

Mia always breaks my heart in those final moments of Purple Rose. But her greatest performance is in Rosemary's Baby. I can't imagine anyone else in that role.

Where is the Mia is bitch troll?

Did you end up on screen, r412?

A perfect lazy Sunday afternoon in the fall matinee

Yes, R420, but a rainy Sunday afternoon in the fall matinee would be even better.

R421 perfection. Get a cup of coffee, a warm blanket, and enjoy!

I love how I WANT TO TALK TO MIRIAM is recycled as I WANT TO TALK TO CHLOE in Match Point a few years later.

A perfect movie if you're trying to fall asleep! I don't begrudge anyone their tastes but OMG I don't see how anyone can stand anything he's ever done. But who am I to talk? I just watched The Trouble with Angels on YouTube and I'm all BEST MOVIE EVER. So like what you want.

“I missed out on job opportunities”

What the fuck job opportunities was Dolores referring to?

Also that mini commercial for Indian food was stupid. Who the fuck cares if your naan bread is good.

R419 No, I didn't end up on the screen... Rewatching it again, I'm wondering if that sequence is one of the last large scale expensive sequences Woody ever shot? All the fallout began relatively soon after.

I watched this film last night. Wow. Everyone is perfectly cast, without exception.

Is it streaming anywhere? Amazon Prime has pulled a lot of his films.