GC Film Series - Spring 2001
Annie Hall ('77)
Romantic adventures of neurotic New York comedian Alvy Singer and his equally neurotic girlfriend Annie Hall. The film traces the course of their relationship from their first meeting, and serves as an interesting historical document about love in the 1970s.
[From Leonard Maltin's Movie & Video Guide]:
Woody's best film, an autobiographical love story with incisive Allenisms on romance,
relationships, fame,
N. Y. C. vs. L. A. , and sundry other topics. Warm, witty, intelligent
Oscar winner for Best Picture, Actress, Direction, Screenplay (Allen and Marshall Brickman).
Look sharp and you'll spot future stars Jeff Goldblum (at the L. A. party), Shelley Hack (on
the street), Beverly D'Angelo (on a TV monitor), and Sigourney Weaver (as Woody's date seen in
extreme long-shot near the end of the picture).
NOTE: If you do not wish to have certain elements of the plot revealed, please wait to read these until after you have seen the film!
I. [From www.filmsite.org]:
Bittersweet, cerebral, stream-of-consciousness, 70s, urban romantic comedy about a New York couple's neurotic love affair. Many consider this Allen's best work, and a transition from his earlier absurdist comedies to a richer, more thoughtful consideration of relationships. Innovatively filmed, with cartoon segments, flashbacks, monologues toward the camera, and other unique elements. Allen co-wrote, directed and stars as a kvetchy, neurotic, Brooklyn stand-up comedian Alvy Singer, wistfully recalling his bygone relationship with flighty, adorable, and irrepressibly Midwestern Annie Hall, an aspiring singer. (Film marks the fourth pairing of Keaton and Allen, who were also an off-screen couple at the time.) At first the cultural gap seems insurmountable, but despite their differences, they fall in love. As they get to know one another, they invariably attempt to change each other, causing friction and their eventual split. The film watches them try new relationships, as they reluctantly pull away from each other. The film, in actuality, chronicles the end of their relationship. Academy Award Nominations: 5, including Best Actor--Woody Allen. Academy Awards: 4, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress--Diane Keaton, Best Original Screenplay.
II. [From Starlight News]:
Annie Hall is Woody Allen’s masterpiece. Never before and never again would he make a film even comparable to this one, and it stands as a testament to his talents as a certified artist, not just a guy who made a lot of funny movies. Though he shared screenwriting duties, this is a very personal, almost autobiographical film from Allen. His hero, a stand-up comic named Alvy Singer, is paranoid about his being Jewish ("Jew eat? Jew?"), is obsessed with death, and loves New York in spite of its many faults. Anyone who’s ever seen a Woody Allen movie recognizes these familiar traits, and of all his films, this one bears his signature most visibly. The screenplay and the direction work off one another to achieve the perfect effect. With many farces and comedic vehicles under his belt, Allen gave us a slightly more serious film here, as we watch the rise and fall of a relationship his character shares with a ditzy singer, of course named Annie Hall (Diane Keaton). The script finds all the right notes as the relationship plays out, but it never indulges in any trite melodrama. This couple seems like one you could know: they’re mismatched, but they give it a go and find some happiness. Alvy falls in love with the sweet, innocent Annie, an uneducated girl from the Midwest, for just these reasons (at their first meeting, Alvy is clearly in control and being pursued; she makes all of the comic blunders and is saddled with all of the awkwardness). Once they become involved, though, Alvy tries to change her, telling her to take night classes and read highbrow books on death. It becomes clear that he doesn’t know what he wants. He repeatedly cites a Groucho Marx joke, "I would never want to be part of a club that would have me for a member," and this repetition is no accident. As the plot progresses, we grow steadily uncertain of whether we want the couple to stay together at all, until we see even before they do that it just isn’t going to work out. This subtle, realistic relationship is contrasted to great effect by two of the film’s most distinguishing characteristics, one of which is Allen himself. Woody Allen is never realistic as an actor, because he is at heart a comedian and is going for laughs playing this overly-neurotic, paranoid whiner we’ve grown to know and love over the course of so many films. His over-reaction to any obstacle, his stammering and spouting off of one-liners, is perfect in that it sets off the realistic quality of the doomed relationship so that we are at once made aware of it, but also kept from growing bored with it. It is Allen's work behind the camera that makes Annie Hall work so well, though. The film is directed in such a way that Woody Allen just seems not to care. He’ll break the rules whenever he feels like it, so the movie remains energetic and effective from titles to credits. Consider the opening: the trademark black and white opening credits are rolled not accompanied by the usual jazz, but with silence. The first sound we hear is Allen’s voice, in character, addressing us. The fourth wall is shattered immediately, giving Allen license to do just about whatever he wants throughout the rest of the film. We get no tired voice-over to introduce us to the situation, just Woody Allen, looking right at us and using a few bad jokes to introduce his character with remarkable effectiveness. After this opening, when Allen puts himself amidst his childhood classroom, takes his best friend and girlfriend on a literal tour of his house (built under a roller coaster) as it was when he was growing up, or suddenly has his two protagonists jump into animation, we simply take it in stride. All of this is intertwined with a barrage of the usual Woody Allen wit. The lines are unforgettable (why he hates LA: "I don’t want to live in a city where the only cultural advantage is that you can make a right turn at a red light."), but so is the situational stuff and the slapstick (his pathetic attempt to drive, his endearing battle with the lobsters, his classic sneeze into the box of cocaine). The surreal moments continue, serving both as hilarious jokes, and remarkably effective observations (who can forget moments like the subtitles during Alvy and Annie’s first extended conversation, Annie’s "mind" getting up and sitting across the room while she and Alvy are in bed, or Alvy’s producing Marshall McLuhan to settle an argument?). Allen even employs the sometimes perilous (but highly successful in this case) split-screen in one classic joke. Both Annie and Alvy are talking with their therapists, and the question of how often they have sex comes up. "Hardly ever," Alvy complains. "Maybe three times a week." "Constantly," Annie sighs. "Probably three times a week." Diane Keaton, who won the Oscar (as did the film and Allen for his direction), is flawless as the flighty, confused Annie (whose unique wardrobe has garnered much attention over the years). She knows just how far to go with the act, too, keeping Annie a real person who wins us over maybe even more than Allen’s Alvy does himself. The supporting cast is first rate as well, with perennial Allen supporter Tony Roberts as Alvy’s actor friend, Rob (who has the odd habit of calling Alvy "Max" – "It’s a good name for you. Max.") coming close to stealing most of his scenes with some great lines he delivers in a perfect dead-pan style. Christopher Walken makes an appearance as Annie’s psychotic (what else?) brother, and is gone all too quickly. Watch for Carol Kane, Shelley Duvall, and Paul Simon in small parts, as well a young Jeff Goldblum who has one single, but immortal line: "I’ve forgotten my mantra." For such a comical and satiric movie, Annie Hall is surprising effective in its emotional aspects. It’s a mature, intelligent film, in which we see that two people, who have devoted a portion of their lives to one another, have reached a point where they must go their separate ways. Still, when we see a perfectly placed sequence flashing back over the film’s highlights, we genuinely feel sad, and that in itself is one of the film's greatest accomplishments.
GC Film Series - Spring 2001
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