Like many films released in the late 70's and early 80's it's very likely that I missed seeing Woody Allen's "Annie Hall" at the time of its release, a semi-autobiographical comedy drama about his real-life bitter sweet romance with Diane Keaton, who plays the titular character.
It's possible I watched it on TV much later and I have only a hazy memory of certain memorable scenes that friends and TV critics have pointed out so, as a typically random choice and as an antidote to recent overly gloomy films I thought I'd give it a try since it's available on Criterion Channel in their current line-up.
Seeing it now it strikes me as being very reminiscent of the kind of European cinema that Allen parodies in a sequence set in a New York art-house cinema queue where he is on a date with Keaton's "Annie" and is irritated by someone who is expounding about the films of Fellini to his bored girlfriend. This leads to a face-off between Allen's "Alvy Singer" and the annoying wanna-be film critic where the latter mentions Marshall McLuhan in order to emphasise his erudition before Allen steps over to a film advertising stand and reveals McLuhan himself standing behind it who then proceeds to put him in his place. Opening in flashback as Allen's "Alvy" reflects on the break-up with "Annie", the plot is a combination of introspective voice-over and Godard-esque breaking of the fourth wall, reconstructed flashbacks, based on real events or fabricated for dramatic/comedic purpose, we are never sure, combined with Allen's gift for comedic writing and paints a picture of an on-off romance with the slightly ditzy "Annie" who enters his life following an introduction from a friend at a tennis match. The milieu of educated, middle-class New Yorkers who enjoy European art-house cinema over the vulgarity of Hollywood is a backdrop to the plot and when "Annie" decides to follow her desire to pursue a career as a singer by travelling to L.A, "Alvy" follows her in the hope of a reunion, a sequence that allows Allen the opportunity to take a pop at the superficiality of the Hollywood social scene of the late 1970's of conspicuous drug-taking and spiritual explorations. The film has many amusing and surprising cameos, from Paul Simon (of Simon & Garfunkel) as a sleazy entrepreneur who promises Annie a recording career to a brief appearance by a young Jeff Goldblum spotted on the phone to his spiritual guru at Hollywood pool party because he has "forgotten his mantra". An awkward dinner with Annie's family reveals Alvy's neurosis about being Jewish (a recurring motif in Allen's comedy and here expressed as his desire to obsessively watch films about the Holocaust when choosing a date film) when introduced to Annie's wealthy "WASP" family and her brother, Duane, played by Christopher Walken, who has a death-wish involving his car. When he offers to drop Annie and Alvy at the airport this provides Allen with another darkly comic moment as he remembers Duane's obsession with deliberately driving his Porsche into an oncoming vehicle.
Of course we already know the trajectory of the plot due to the preface to the film and "Annie Hall" ends with a rather touching sequence where the two former lovers take their leave of each other in a very civil fashion back in New York.
I quite enjoyed the film despite dozing off and missing the entire Christopher Walken episode - seeing his name during the end credits meant back-tracking to watch that whole sequence again. There are other cameos by actors early in their careers, such as Shelley Duval as "Pam" who he has a short-lived fling with in between a temporary separation from Keaton's "Annie" and overall the film has the air of the type of European cinema loved by the intellectual elite of New York - think a parody of Éric Rohmer combined with Allen's signature incisive New York Jewish comedy.
"Annie Hall", Dir: Woody Allen, 1977
Criterion Channel
"Did it send Ravi to sleep?" out of 10 rating : 7
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