Favourite Woody Allen film ?

[weslgarlic]

I missed Blue Jasmine because the nearest cinema to Wakefield showing it was Sheffield

Will have to wait until either DVD or download it

I was wrong they are showing it this week and next at Wakefield Cineworld

Look forward to catching it

[kipper]

"After that it got pretty late, and we both had to go, but it was great seeing Annie again. I... I realized what a terrific person she was, and... and how much fun it was just knowing her; and I... I, I thought of that old joke, y'know, the, this... this guy goes to a psychiatrist and says, "Doc, uh, my brother's crazy; he thinks he's a chicken." And, uh, the doctor says, "Well, why don't you turn him in?" The guy says, "I would, but I need the eggs." Well, I guess that's pretty much now how I feel about relationships; y'know, they're totally irrational, and crazy, and absurd, and... but, uh, I guess we keep goin' through it because, uh, most of us... need the eggs."

Annie Hall is my favorite

[JohnnyThrottle]

[Pagefan55]

Probably "Annie Hall."

[Strider]

Well, it won't be "Magic in the Moonlight", that's for sure. Meh.

[scylla]

"Annie Hall". Most of them divide into the funny ones and the ones where he's trying to be all Serious Artist (to be Bergman, basically) and it isn't quite working. "Annie Hall" has the funny and the soul - he's using his own voice and not trying to be anything else, and that's where the best art (and the best jokes) come from. I saw it on TV at 13 and it was one of those cultural experiences where you feel a whole new world opening up (the start of my interest in cinema, basically). I wanted to see EVERYTHING by this person and collected them all (on bloody VHS, useless now) and bought his books of short stories and so on. This despite the fact that at 13 I obviously had no experience of the themes the film explores, and also wasn't getting all the jokes. I had no idea who Marshall MacLuhan was, had never heard the word "impeach", and the talking-head children were especially weird (I didn't know what methodone was, and thought "I'm into leather" meant she sold jackets or sofas). The line "that's OK, I'm starting to get back some feeling in my jaw now" made me wonder why his JAW should be suffering... and the stuff about Wagner and anti-Semitism was just baffling. (Anything referencing Alvy's Jewishness and cultural contrasts with Annie was a bit baffling; I didn't know what "The Sorrow And The Pity" was about and, although I knew what the Holocaust was, totally failed to grasp that Alvy's pessimistic outlook on life - "you're very lucky...to just be miserable" - might be informed by it). But from that opening scene with Allen talking straight to camera with the plain yellow background ("Catskill" was also a mystery), he just had me.

I also love "Crimes and Misdemeanors" - the most successful attempt at a "serious" film, I'd say (not going the full Bergman). And "Manhattan" goes without saying.

[Pagefan55]

Excellent observations, Scylla. I particularly love Allen's "Coke" scene and the scenes with Annie's brother and family. "Crimes and Misdemeanors" and "Manhattan" are excellent films too -- it goes without saying.

[scylla]

Excellent observations, Scylla. I particularly love Allen's "Coke" scene and the scenes with Annie's brother and family. "Crimes and Misdemeanors" and "Manhattan" are excellent films too -- it goes without saying.

Yeah! I was forgetting the coke scene - that's another thing I don't think I quite got at the time. I mean, I suppose I got that it was "drugs" of some kind, but couldn't have said what. Innocent little thing, I was.

Also a young Jeff Goldblum on the phone, saying "I forgot my mantra!". Could never tell what he was saying.