I have always loved Woody Allen movies, especially as I get older and understand them a little bit more. I have had a hearing loss since birth and have come to rely on subtitles to understand everything that is being said. There is an awful lot of mumbling/low talking in his movies that is hard to catch sometimes. Very few of his movies are subtitled and a movie like 'Interiors' is especially frustrating to follow because of this.
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the early, funny films
Added 10/18/2008
These are nearly all of the early great Woody Allen Films (sadly missing are Take the Money and Run and Play It Again, Sam). Lots of slapstick as well his famous New York Psychobabble-even a serious drama. Of course, the soundtracks tend to feature his favorite traditional jazz-he even plays on one (Sleeper) These are the films that made the man. Much to enjoy for Woody Allen fans.
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Wonderful Witty Woody Allen...an excellent collection of his best!
Added 9/22/2007
This collection features some of the best of Woody Allen. Bananas was simply outrageous fun along with Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex.
"Sleeper" is a look at life in 2073 a la Woody Allen. This too was a fun movie. "Annie Hall" and "Manhattan" were perfect depicting life and love in New York City. I am hoping to see Stardust Memories and Interiors soon since I just received this collection. If you admire the work of Woody Allen then this collection is for you. Too bad "Take the Money and Run" is not in this bunch. I had to order it separately but "TTMAR" was hilarious for Woody's first movie! Enjoy!
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Prelude to the Later Masterpieces
Added 9/16/2007
I've seen these films over the the years numerous times, never really loved them, but recognize them now as the necessary practice of a developing talent, who has grown enormously over the years. Yes, "Annie Hall" is a kick, but compared to "Crimes and Misdemeanors," "Hannah and Her Sisters," and "Deconstructing Harry," it must be seen as a young work, well-conceived, but lacking the depth of his more mature work. Others disagree, of course, and why not? There are numerous bright spots in these films. Certainly "Manhattan" is a unique love-poem to the city. Woody's preoccupation with Dostoevsky is shown to great affect in "Love and Death," but all in all I prefer his late work, and believe that Mia Farrow played a crucial role in inspiring his mature phase. Woody himself has expressed reservations for his work overall. There are indeed limitations, and it is doubtful that he will ever be compared to the greats. But he is certainly great enough for me. He remains the most exciting director of our generation.
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The best Woody Allen collection
Added 3/19/2007
Enjoyed Annie Hall again last night - Best Picture, 1977? My husband loved Bananas and all of the earlier movies.
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All Those Chambers
Added 3/23/2009
This is cinematic ecstasy - pure untainted drama, clearly told and directly human. The story's truth flows forth like a mad river - with force and clarity.
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Faux Bergman
Added 12/2/2008
Allen has said on several occasions that he doesn't have the stuff to make movies of the same caliber as his Fellini and Bergman, his two cinematic heroes. Nothing attests to the truth of that self-estimation better than "Interiors." Don't get me wrong. Mr. Allen has made some excellent films. "Zelig" and "Crimes and Misdemeanors" are two of the best American movies you'll find. But "Interiors" has a ring of inauthenticity to it from the very beginning. It looks like something that a talented undergraduate film student who worships Bergman would've put together.
"Interiors" apes Bergman in just about every way imaginable: the absence of a musical score; long shots of faces; silent moments longer than Hollywood convention; soliloquies about death, relationships, and angst; empty room- and landscapes; and characters struggling to reconcile inner and outer lives. This all works with Bergman. But in "Interiors," it comes across almost as parody rather than homage. The final scene in the film, with the three sisters profiled as they gaze out onto an empty ocean, is embarrassingly portentious. The artistic struggles of Richard Jordan's character are hackneyed. The actress sister character seems an afterthought never fully developed. The father figure has no depth (even E.G. Marshall, a great character actor, couldn't quite pull it off). And the "interior" struggles the characters undergo too often seem either contrived (the middle sister's inability to find a creative outlet) or stereotypical (the eldest sister's writer's block).
There are, however, two breaths of fresh air in the fim. Maureen Stapleton's acting is superb, and the dance scene in which she breaks a vase (another piece of heavy-handed symbolism) is masterfully done. Geraldine Page, an actress I don't normally care for, is brilliant in her portrayal of the psychologically and emotionally broken jilted wife. And she, unlike so many of the other characters, had good script from which to work. It's as if all of Allen's creative genius went into the writing of her character.
The film is worth seeing, I suppose, because it's an Allen film. But it's not great--and, I suspect, not even good.
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Being Beige is not for Wimps
Added 9/10/2008
I saw this film when it came out in 1978. The scene I admired the most is towards the beginning when Eve brings a valuable vase to her daughter's house and then fumbles with it. I was terrified that she would drop it and it would shatter taking out everyone and everything around her.
Rich white people are confusing with all of their beiges and pale colors and critical self-editing.
It must be so difficult to be creative when you have been trained to be suspicious of everything you don't already admire.
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