One of the problems Woody Allen faces when he is trying to defend himself against charges of pedophilia is how often the male protagonists in his films, usually well into middle age, pursue and win the affections of much, much younger women. Most notoriously, he cast himself, at age 42, as a man dating 17-year-old…
dvd of the week In Blue Jasmine, Woody Allen has provided Cate Blanchett, arguably the greatest actress of her generation, her greatest role – a woman destroyed by her own pretensions. The film’s comedy is in the nervous discomfort of class warfare, the clueless vapidity of the rich and capitalistic. It is Allen going to…
I’m not sure why Woody Allen decided to set Blue Jasmine in San Francisco. He can turn a city into a main character of his films; from Manhattan to Vicki Cristina Barcelona to Midnight in Paris. But in Blue Jasmine, the city is neither lovingly shot nor does it really have a role to play…
dvd of the week Woody Allen has been hit or miss over the last decade or so, but his latest film, Midnight in Paris, is one of the good ones; a delightful, fantastical comedy about what happens when one of your greatest dreams comes true. As in most of Allen’s comedies, if Allen isn’t the…
dvd of the week Paul Rudd has been in a string of broad, absurd comedies over the last five years that have made him a star but which have not been remotely insightful. Our Idiot Brother does not have the depth of a good Woody Allen or the painfully strong laughs of Judd Apatow’s best,…
