So, I am going to have a very hard time doing a synopsis for this movie, because it doesn't follow a linear path. So I guess I will sum up the movie kind of how Woody Allen does it in the opening sequence. He basically says that this is a movie about his relationships with women and how they've failed. Annie Hall is his most recent girlfriend, and the one he seems to be the most attached to.
Right before I started this movie, I spied a few adjectives that Netflix used to describe Annie Hall. One of those words was cerebral, and I don't think that that word could describe any other movie better. A lot of these jokes in this movie I wouldn't laugh at until a few minutes later... when I actually got them. Granted, the jokes were funny, they just took a little thinking. For instance, the title of this blog. Alvy (Woody Allen) tells a joke at the beginning of the movie that goes something like "There are two women having dinner, and one of them says to the other 'The food here is terrible' and the other says 'I know! And the portions are so small!'" Get it? Okay, take a minute... I'll tell you. Why would you want big portions if the food is terrible? See, that's funny. It just doesn't seem like a joke at first.
I have to say that I don't think that Annie Hall is a romantic comedy. I don't know if anyone has ever classified this movie as such, but if they did they would be sorely mistaken. Sure, this is a movie about relationships (although there isn't that much romance in it) and there are some really funny parts, but I wouldn't lump this movie in with say... Sweet Home Alabama or How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. The feeling of this one was different.
I thought Woody Allen was hilarious, and not in a conventional way, which was nice. It was perfect the way he would address the audience in the middle of a scene. It didn't feel cheesy like it can in other movies, it was natural. He was filling us in on things we needed to know in a way that we could understand. I liked that we could see some of the things that were going on in his head, even if they were a little paranoid, like when he envisions Annie coming out of her body and sitting bored in a chair when he is trying to have sex with her, or when he imagines himself looking like a stereotypical Orthodox Jew when he is at dinner with Annie's family. I could really believe that Alvy was actually having these thoughts and feelings, which made them real. It isn't over the top, which was nice.
Annie Hall (Diane Keeton) as a character kind of got on my nerves. She represents pretty much everything I hate about women in movies. A lot of them have this stereotypical attitude that the world is against them and they have to fight the power to get what they want. Well, that's annoying. At first, Annie was so cute. In the parts of the movie before she starts seeing an "analyst" (or a psychologist) she is very sweet. She laughs a lot, smiles, has a good time. Then, as the movie progresses, she starts to see this doctor, and changes, and there is this whole scene where she is talking to her shrink about how if she has sex with Alvy (Woody Allen) then she would be going against her feelings or something. She becomes so much more serious and less fun. She moves to California and becomes so different and un-fun. It's lame. I say bring back the old Annie. There wasn't anything wrong with her. Everyone is a bit crazy, right?
Probably my favorite scene in the whole movie (besides when Annie is being all cute when she meets Alvy) is after Annie and Alvy have broken up for the first time, and she calls him at 3 in the morning telling him to come over and that its an emergency. When he gets there, she tells him that there's a spider in the bathroom. While there really is a spider in the bathroom (actually two), it becomes very obvious that she just wanted him to come over, and the two of them say that they miss each other and they get back together. However, the excitement I felt at them getting back together was flushed down the toilet when she asks him if there was another girl in his room when she had called him to come over. There was. He had been on a date that evening and they had gone back to his place. He, of course, lies and says there wasn't, and while I can see why he would lie, its situations like that in movies that I hate, because it is an immediate red flag that while things may be good right now, eventually, they are going to turn ugly. So frustrating.
However, in that scene where Alvy saves Annie from the spider, I loved that there were framed pictures of Alvy on the wall from the day where they try to cook lobster but all of the live lobsters escape and Alvy has to pick all of them up and put them back in the pot. Its little things like that that make movies real for me.
I also found it almost charming how Alvy doesn't like publicity. He is a stand up comedian that everyone seems to know, and yet when someone tries to take his picture or get his autograph, he seems almost annoyed by it. It just adds to his character, how he is in this profession where people will recognize him, and even though he doesn't like being noticed, he still keeps getting on stage. It's like he likes the torture.
I didn't really understand Rob's (Tony Roberts) character at all. He is supposed to be Alvy's agent, I guess, but he just seems to come in and out at random moments. Also, he calls Alvy Max because Rob thinks its a better name, which would be fine, except he says it EVERY LINE. I guess he was trying to make the name stick, but it was really distracting.
So, I'm going to ask the question that I'm sure a lot of people ask themselves when seeing this movie. Does Christopher Walken ever have a leading role in anything? He's this famous actor and yet, the only roles I can remember him for are ones where he plays very minor roles. Pulp Fiction, America's Sweethearts, Wedding Crashers, Annie Hall, the list goes on. It's very strange, just like he is very strange. He gave me the creeps in this one, partially because he goes on this long tangent about how when driving he sometimes gets the urge to crash head on into an oncoming car, and partially because his face was so smooth. I barely recognized him. Ugh, I can't get the image out of my head. Gives me chills...
I feel like this blog is very scattered. I can't stay on topic very well, but I think that Woody Allen wouldn't mind. Annie Hall, as a whole, is a scattered movie. As I said, it doesn't follow a natural timeline, but in the end it does end up making sense, and the ending is actually very nice. It is just this montage of all of the high and low points of Annie and Alvy's relationship. It isn't too cheesy, but really genuine.
So what would I rate this movie? Hmmmm... There are parts of it that I would give five stars, and then there are other parts that wouldn't even make me give this movie an honorable mention. So... let's give it a 3.5... Above average for the awesome parts, but not quite perfect. Don't worry fans, this is only my first Woody Allen movie. There are more out there that I will try to get to someday soon.
The Godfather series is coming up soon. I think I might want to watch all of them all at once, which would mean I would need a long time to watch them. I still have From Here to Eternity and Close Encounters of the Third Kind on my list. I guess we'll see.
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