Manhattan review

 Number 293 on the top 1000 films of all time is Woody Allen's romantic, comedy-drama 'Manhattan.'

Woody Allen stars as Isaac Davis, a 42-year-old TV comedy writer living in Manhattan. He is dating the 17-year-old Tracy (Muriel Hemingway) but soon falls in love with his best friend's mistress Mary Wilkie (Diane Keaton.)

This was a comedy, right? Woody Allen directed it, right? He wrote it too. So, why was it so unfunny? The film was only ninety-six minutes, but it felt so much longer. It wasn't until the forty-sixth minute that I even cracked a smile. The rest of the film rarely elicited more than a chuckle.

And that comes back to Woody Allen who effectively always plays the same character - a neurotic, middle-aged Jewish man with a tendency to psycho-analyse everything. it's all well and good, once or twice, but after a while, it becomes tedious. Tedious is the best way to describe this film. It was just a bunch of would-be academics name-dropping philosopher after philosopher.

Manhattan was also uncomfortable in its depiction of Isaac and Tracy's relationship. He's old enough to be her father. And the romantically inexperienced Hemingway also experienced a lot of discomfort in the role. Considering the allegations that have since been levelled against Allen and considering how he is married to his step-daughter who is over thirty years his junior, it only made things ickier. I know that nothing ever came of the allegations, but it still felt creepy.

If I were to praise the film on anything it would be its cinematography, which was wonderful. Allen shot the film in black-and-white, which gave it a timeless, vintage feel. The scenes of Allen and Keaton in the planetarium where they were silhouetted against the stars were gorgeous.

I've seen a few Woody Allen films in my time. I can't say I like them very much. Even though, they're comedies, they're just not funny.

Mr Nobody review

 Number 396 on the top 1000 films of all time is the science-fiction film 'Mr Nobody.'

Nemo Nobody (Jared Leto) is a 118-year old man at the end of his life. He is living in a futuristic society where humanity has achieved practical immortality. A journalist (Daniel Mays) interviews Nemo about his life. Nemo gives a sprawling, contradictory story which explores the many different paths that his life could have taken. He focusses on key events that happened when he was nine, fifteen and thirty-four. Some of the events include the break-up of his parents marriage as well as his own relationships with a number of women.

If there is anything that this film taught me it's that I'm not the biggest fan of science-fiction. I'm not maligning a whole genre - there is some sci-fi I like, but a lot of science-fiction seems pretentious and self-indulgent; writers and directors trying to show off their intellectual ability. And, of course, you can argue that I'm being bitter because I'm not clever enough to understand it. Partly that is true, but, for me, cinema should be a form of escape. It should be something where I can turn my brain off and not worry about missing half the film. Sure, that doesn't mean it can't be arty or intellectual, but I want to easily enjoy and understand a film.

Anyway, I'm saying all that, because I think 'Mr Nobody' was pretentious, self-indulgent and overly-long. The concept of it was interesting enough. A multi-verse idea lends itself to lots of narrative potential - every action has an equal and opposite reaction. And every decision you do or don't take can create a whole new universe. And this could have been interesting to watch if the film didn't explore every single way Mr Nobody's life could have gone. We see what life would have been like if he had chosen to live with his mum and with his dad. We see what his life would have been like if he had dated and married Anna (Diane Kruger) or if he had married Elise (Sarah Polley) or Jean (Linh Dan Pham.) All of these different storylines bloated the film and made it far longer than it needed to be.

And because so much of the film is told in flashback, with Thomas Byrne playing a nine-year-old Nemo and Toby Regbo playing Nemo at fifteen, it didn't really give Jared Leto a chance to act. He isn't the film all that much which is weird considering he plays the main character. He's a great actor - he won an Oscar for Dallas Buyers Club so why you won't allow him to do his thing is just a mystery to me. And when we do see him, he is mostly in make-up or against a horrifically, fake-looking green-screen. Seriously? The CGI was awful. Or perhaps that was supposed to be the point. Mr Nobody gives so many contradictory accounts that we're not sure which account to believe. Maybe the flashbacks with the awful CGI are supposed to be the imposters.

Although, one good thing about the film was its soundtrack. It was diverse and varied consisting of artists like Otis Redding, the Police and Buddy Holly. But this great soundtrack didn't make up for what was ultimately a convoluted, overly-confusing and self-indulgent film. And a film that severely under-utilised its lead actor.

Annie Hall Review

 Number 177 on the top 1000 films of all time is Woody Allen's romantic comedy-drama Annie Hall.

Alvy Singer (Woody Allen) is a neurotic, Jewish comedian living in New York. Having always been unsuccessful with women, he thinks he's struck gold with the titular Annie Hall (Diane Keaton.) But when that relationship inevitably fails, he spends the whole film wondering why.

 Generally regarded as Woody Allen's greatest film and one of the greatest comedies of all time, Annie Hall didn't particularly tickle my funny bone. Sure there were lots of clever use of meta-humour and fourth-wall breaks which were comical, but the entire film set like a set-up for a joke. I was waiting and waiting for a punchline that never arrived. I was chuckling throughout, but never rolling in the aisles, so to speak. Perhaps this is due to Woody Allen's comedic style. I'm not particularly familiar with his work, but I've read that Allen's stand-up, rather than following the conventional set up and punchline, was more of a rambling monologue.

And perhaps this is why the film didn't quite land with me. It was more of a series of comical vignettes that roughly match up as opposed to a cohesive narrative. I imagine that was intentional but it still made the film very fragmented. Furthermore, in Allen's comedy he usually plays the character of the neurotic Jewish man, which is what we see here. While this could potentially be comedic gold, and his cynical mindset elicited a few laughs, the character did start to grate on me after a while.

This isn't to say that I disliked the whole film. I did enjoy the meta-humour from Alvy's asides to the audience to the subtitles highlighting Alvy's and Annie's hidden feelings behind their shared smalltalk to when Alvy brings out the real-life Marshall Mcluhan to confront a loud-mouthed moviegoer with controversial opinions about his filmography. Diane Keaton played Annie Hall with a sympathy that made her more likeable than Alv. Her character was very much the polar opposite of him - spontaneous, optimistic and happy-go-lucky which was a refreshing change to Alv's pessimism.

And the supporting cast were great as well. Paul Simon gave a good turn as an actor, Shelley Duvall was great as usual and as always Jeff Goldblum and Christopher Walken were delightfully over the top. I still maintain that The Deer Hunter was Walken's best film as he is the most human there. In a lot of his other roles, he's just playing an inflated caraicture of himself.

While Annie Hall was funny in places with an Oscar-winning performance from Diane Keaton, there was just too much set-up and not enough punchline. As they say, good comedy is all in the delivery, and for me, the delivery just wasn't there.