No. 6: Annie Hall (Allen)

Remember that this is my personal ballot and not the final compiled ballot that will be published in this space on 2/29/12.

(Before I get started:  The rain rain rain finally came came came and I am sitting here on our red sofa, writing out this post in longhand.  Mavis, old oldest cat, is sleeping on my lap and Annie Hall is playing as I write this.  Carol Kane just said, "No, that's wonderful.  I love being reduced to a cultural stereotype."  This is the only way I can enjoy Bay Area rain:  when I am inside, windows slightly opened, and I am absorbing the crackling electrical atmosphere in peaceful quiet.)

I have already discussed Annie Hall a fair bit in this post, so I will not talk too much about the film here right now.  I will say that Allen and Marshall Brickman's "kitchen sink" approach, i.e.  breaking the fourth wall numerous times, the use of animation, subtitles, jerking us around in time repeatedly, certain documentary-style flourishes, etc, ... was absolutely magical to behold as a nine year old in 1977.  And still holds up enormously well today.  As a child I was quite convinced that the film was a documentary, the life story of comedian Alvy Singer, I suppose.  My mother had to explain to me that Woody Allen was not a comedian, he was a writer and a director.

April 3, 1978 was a big night in our little household, a town house on Abrams Ave, in Dallas, Texas.  It was Oscars Night and Oscars Night has always been a big deal to our family.  (David Mamet has an excellent essay in his book, Writing in Restaurants, that proposes that the two biggest American Holidays now are Super Bowl Sunday and Oscar Night.  And as much as our family loves sports, we are def an Oscar Night family more than a Super Bowl Sunday one.)

The three of us were huddled, downstairs, sitting at our dining room table (our cat, Layla, was prob sulking somewhere, acting aloof), watching the show unfold on our modest black and white television.  I do not remember this but I did some research, natch, and Bob Hope was the host that night.  It was the eighteenth time he had hosted the Oscars, and his last.  Also, the next day was a school day for me, so I did not see the entire show.  I trudged upstairs, prob throwing a fit the whole while, went to bed, and missed (I think) the Best Director and Best Picture presentations.  And this was an especially big Oscar Night for the three of us because we had v serious rooting interests:  Star Wars had the most nominations and the conventional wisdom was that it would be the big big winner that night.

Do not get me wrong.  We all saw Star Wars together in the theater upon its release.  Andy (my Da) and I even liked it a good deal.  Donna (my Mum) could take Star Wars or leave it, as best as I can remember.  Still, I also remember telling my friend, Ricky Minor (at our lockers), that Star Wars was good but Close Encounters of the Third Kind was even better after I had seen that, too.  I had seen Annie Hall before both of those blockbusters, and even at that age, I was nearly ten years old, it was Woody Allen's masterpiece that I enjoyed far more than Star Wars or Close Encounters.

Plus, my mother had another big rooting interest, in addition to Annie Hall, a film she still adores:  Julia.  I do not remember it at all but apparently Vanessa Redgrave gave a v controversial, political acceptance speech when she claimed her Best Supporting Actress Award.

The night went v well for the Spitlers in the end.  Star Wars won a bushel full of Oscars but only for technical categories.  Julia and Annie Hall swept both the Screenwriting Awards, and nearly swept all four of the Acting categories, Richard Dreyfuss won for The Goodbye Girl.  And, of course, Woody Allen won for Best Director and Annie Hall won Best Picture.  Allen was not there to accept his Oscar.  He always plays with his jazz band on Monday nights in Manhattan.  It was the closest ever, and likely always will be, that the Academy's taste matched with ours.  Yeah, forget likely, I will never see such a triumphant Oscar Night like that again, which is what makes this memory so special.

Top Six quotes, moments from Annie Hall:

1.  "Don't worry.  We can walk to the curb from here."
2.  "Yeah, grass, right? The illusion that it will make a white woman more like Billie Holiday."
3.  "Hey, don't knock masturbation.  It's sex with someone I love."
4.  " 'The food here is terrible.' 'I know, and such small portions.' "
5.  The spider in the bathroom sequence is one of the most touching and realistic things I have ever seen in a cinema, so poignant and lovely.
6.  The brilliant New Wave pastiche:  the subtitled sequence on Annie's patio.

Mwah, 


Ardent

I enjoyed the American Masters,

Woody Allen, a Documentary, immensely, even if it is, basically, a film version of Eric Lax's (Lax is also one of the "witnesses") glowing, sanitized authorized biography of Mr Allen.

I did not want a hatchet job, but more objectivity would be appreciated, and, I imagine, will eventually come down the pipeline in the future.

"I need the eggs"

And, I guess, we will never see the "rest" of Annie Hall, particularly, the Allen as a New York Knick fantasy sequence, until after Allen's death.

In fact, it will be interesting to see, if Allen's estate will let commentaries, deleted scenes, and other feature-ettes be part of Allen's blu rays in the future.  I hope so.  He (and his audience) deserve them, even if Allen finds them abominable.  (Though, part of me, likes that Allen lets the films stand on their own in dvd form.  I am v torn.)

I wish they would have told the Marshall McLuhan story; Allen wanted someone else and was furious and pouted for ages, even when McLuhan was on the set.  He need not have worried, obv, because the scene is American film history now, and insanely funny, and perfect.

But I did like that they highlighted Pauline Kael's famous last quote from her review of Stardust Memories (a sadly prophetic film about celebrity -- John Lennon was murdered by an adoring fan just after its' release -- that I rather enjoy, despite its' bleakness):

If Woody Allen finds success very upsetting and wishes the public would go away, this picture should help him stop worrying.

David Thomson does not like Allen's films much, either, (though Thomson seems to have softened his attitude towards Allen in his latest installment of his Biographical Dictionary of Film) and John Simon hated Woody.

As much as I respect Kael and Thomson, (John Simon was a douche and was constantly getting exposed in Review of Reviewers in Spy Magazine) they are both wrong.  Woody Allen is one of the greatest American film makers, period, full stop.





See you Monday nights at Mortons
- Celia Brady

Despite a v embarrassing and awful

Montage sequence that inexplicably included what sounds like an emo American indie song (plop in the middle of a French film), Le Noms des Gens (The Names of Love [US title]), is one of the best comedies I have seen in years.

Right from the beginning, with actor, Jacques Gamblin, lamenting his plight of having the most common name in France, Arthur Martin, comparing his situation to that of the North Korean football team in the most recent World Cup (nine of their starting eleven had the surname, Kim), I knew this was going to be my kind of movie.

"Look at my GIANT, gaudy trophy. And my Cuh-razy pumps."

Of course, just the premise of the film is right in my wheelhouse:  Gamblin (Martin) is "seduced" and falls for a French/Algerian beauty, Sara Forestier (her character's name is Baya), who sleeps with Right-Wingers in order to convert them to the Left and cure them of their fascisme.  Gamblin is not a Right-Winger, he always votes for the Socialist, Jospin, who always finishes a v distant third in every general election (the bulk of the film of the film is set in the late 1980s) but Forestier "likes" him, probably due to the fact that, like her, there are "taboos", secrets in his family's past.

Both families, and those dreaded "taboos", are used to hilarious effect throughout the film.  Gamblin's parents, in particular, who are obsessed with all the "superior" technologies that ultimately flop, i.e. Betamax and the first giant laserdiscs that came out.

The film, co-written and directed by Michel Leclerc, is obviously influenced by Woody Allen's work, especially Annie Hall, even including some crustacean scenes.  It is a delight to watch, very sexy, and extremely funny.  And also, like a lot of really good comedies, it has a crucial, serious center, regarding immigration, religion, and the "secrets and lies" that all families share.

************

A couple of years ago I was channel hopping late at night and happened upon a famous, modern French film star (I do not remember his name) on Charlie Rose's awful program.  The actor was bitching about the "new French cinema" and how it was just like Hollywood now, homogenized, and "safe".  "Where are all the Godards and Truffauts and Melvilles and Rohmers these days," he seemed to be suggesting.  And, yes, I know that Godard is still alive and just came out with a new film (which I am still hoping I get a chance to see soon).  But back then, I really had no idea what he was talking about.  I was not watching a lot of French cinema then.  Now that I am watching a good deal more French films these days, I see exactly what he was talking about.  As much as I love Le Nom des Gens or Love Crime or Carlos or Potiche, it is plain, that unlike the Cahiers du Cinema gang, who took the ideas of Hitchcock, Ford, Welles, and others to new and stratospheric heights, that the contemporary French cinema is tending to "copy" Hollywood style and directors, as opposed to using that style and those directors as inspiration.  Except, now, that I think about it, I might take Carlos (and Assayas) off that list because Assayas tackled the extremely difficult subject of terrorism in a moving, yet still, entertaining way.  Carlos' story cannot help but be entertaining and edge-of-you-seat viewing.  There is no way a film as good, like Carlos, could be made in Hollywood, no way.

Having said all that, I must admit that I am sure there are French auteurs today that I am not seeing here in the States, and that my access is limited.  It could v well be the case that I am merely getting access to the most US-friendly, Hollywood-ized French films there are.  I am hoping that is the case, and that I will eventually find all those "grimy/arty" films in the future.

And where are all the Jean-Pierre Melvilles these days? Although the style (espec the lighting) and music would have been decidedly different, Carlos, would be a topic that Melville would have relished.  (And he'd prob have done it in a hundred minutes, to boot.)

Mwah, ...