Annie Hall: Classic or Dud?

Marshall McLuhan was not Allen's first choice. Federico Fellini and Luis Buñuel were asked first.

ok so call me dumb but anyone want to explain this line?

ANNIE (Smiling) What's so great about New York? I mean, it's a dying city. You read Death in Venice.

What does Death in Venice have to do with New York?

Sub-plot of Death in Venice is that people still go there although there is a disease rampant in the city. So it's dying but still people love it?

I mean whole thing is about death obviously but I think that's what that is referring to. Indeed it's more like a celebration of decay...maybe...possibly.

Joey Five-Cents!

Annie Hall is neither classic nor dud. It is just hopelessly irrelevant.

HOPELESSLY

Shh! Some of us still need the eggs, ok?

It can still be classic and hopelessly irrelevant (although I don't think it is that either).

what the hell is an irrelevant movie? it's not relevant to your life as a spanish fighter jet pilot? it's not relevant to deregulation legislation of the 1980s? what?

i'd like to know what that line abt death in venice means also. i mean if ned's right, that it's at ppl loving a city despite the decay, wouldnt annie then love new york? rather than asking why ppl love it?

The line is there mostly to set up the joke that follows it. He says you didn't read it until I gave it to you, she says he only gave her books with death in the title. Or something like that.

This is true of course! We shouldn't overanalyse but...

I think she saying that people (in the novel) are kind of oblivious to the dangers of the city (or they know about them but don't care) and Annie is saying but we're cleverer than they - we KNOW it's a dying city and we should get out and move to L.A.

And don't forget that later Alvy says "A relationship is like a shark. It has to constantly move forward or it dies. And I think what we have here is a dead shark" (I'm paraphrasing here). Which could also apply to, um, New York in the late 1970s, early 80s and so, er, is sub-consciously agreeing with Annie's earlier comment.

I think the "New York is dying, let's get out" meme was big in the seventies, as was Visconti's Death in Venice so it might have been a more obvious parallel then than it is now... Annie = realist, Woody = hopelessly morbid romantic, ie set-up of all Woody Allen films of the period...

They would make a great double bill.

New York (certainly Manhattan) is now essentially dead for anyone except the demographic that populates Woody's urban comedies.

also Aimless, yer a dope.

Aimless might be a lot of things but dope isn't one of them, I don't think.

However your first sentence is pretty OTM.

I love it when they go to L.A.

ok, Aimless' "remock" (as Woody wd say) was dopey.

I've still never been to LA, partly cuz AH warned me about it.

By the way, while I was googling that line from Annie Hall, I came across a great thing. The New Yorker digital reader gives you searchable access to every single issue of the New Yorker from 1925. While it's in beta, it's free - you just have to put in an email address. After beta they're charging but it's good for now.

http://archives.newyorker.com/

dayum

calling this movie hopelessly irrelevant is either dopey or just meaningless. it's not irrelevant, either as a love story or as a film... i mean, i guess if you're looking at it as a guide to new york city living, maybe!

influence in the genre, whether you feel it to be positive or negative, at least proves 'relevance'

also, asking the happy couple how they're doing so well is still A+

fuck a relevance.

and i always carry a sock o' manure in movie lines.

Anyone see it at the Brooklyn Bridge Park tonight? I have to admit there was something magical about seeing Allen and Keaton by the bridge and then looking to my right and seeing the bridge (from the other side obv)

The movie is visually gorgeous
― Sym (shmuel), Thursday, 25 March 2004 08:24 (7 years ago) Bookmark

I'm always cheerleading for how consistently good-to-great American cinematography was in the '70s. Gordon Willis, top tier.

yeah. i am not great with cinematographers but woody did pretty well - interiors is memorably beguiling, stardust memories really well done etc.

anyway i just rescreened this & was stunned; i wonder where i was at when i first saw it, as little of my idea of what it was like related to its emotional punch. as a portrait of the dynamics of their relationship it's incredible, catching how both their idiosyncrasies are at first endearing & attractive & vital, & then eventually the fuel for their downfall.

For me, Annie Hall holds up much better than Manhattan, even though the thing that most bothers me about Manhattan--anti-pretension masking wild pretensions--is just starting to creep in. (I realize Manhattan is a sacred film for many people, so I don't really want to start knocking it.)

i kind of can't remember manhattan that well at this moment, so would probably benefit from catching that again, also (i had a couple of years of telling everyone that stardust was his best movie, i guess pointedly on account of being some kind of connoisseurish b&w alternative to manhattan, though a rewatch convinced me otherwise - though i am very fond of it, particularly its precision meta-referential take on his career, & sequences of it in particular, it doesn't have the rhythm of his best, & ends a couple of times before ending, etc). what was interesting in annie hall, kinda prefiguring love & death, in which intellectual references are quoted for their absurd phonic qualities & for a humorous shift in register, was that to a more restrained degree he's still using those references kind of self-deprecatingly & to impugn others, always as a distancing, complicating thing in communication or relationships. i'm not sure how pretentious manhattan is; the parts that stick with me are those examples of wonderfully human and common reflexive bullshit - don't fall in love with me, i'm broken etc, which, like with annie hall, kinda resonate deeply whether you are woody or not. eesh anyway this slayed me.

also, just as an aside, woody looks so great in this film, outfits & everything - idk if elmo's reading this thread but there were some plaid shirt/herringbone jacket combos that i thought he'd be into

http://29.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lshlhnt4SG1qg7mglo1_500.png

Ralph Lauren, ya know

I can't defend Manhattan as anything other than an occasionally amusing film but I've made my peace with the thing.

I love Manhattan. You guys are loons.

Annie Hall is better but polyphonic otm

i love manhattan too but i haven't seen since i was a teenager and i'm reluctant to revisit it pretty much the same reasons i'm scared to revisit catcher in the rye. still it's showing in town soon on the big screen so i'll definitely check it out (if only for the opening monologue and the gershwin). if i can tolerate/borderline enjoy vicky cristina barcelona and pine for the relative quality of 90s woody allen i'm pretty sure manhattan will deliver just fine. do wish he'd make another movie w/ diane keaton. manhattan murder mystery really should be the template - small cast, alda-huston-keaton-allen, maybe switch up the other two parties (maybe throw tony roberts and dianne wiest in the mix) but a doddering nick and norah type series w/ allen and keaton is something i could actually imagine being entertained by, and there aren't alot of scenarios for 'future woody allen movies' i can say that about.