SHADOWS AND FOG (WOODY ALLEN)

While SHADOWS AND FOG is a pretty good movie, and uses the titular elements that channel old British mystery novels, German Expressionism and American Film Noir, it's the second Woody Allen comedy after RADIO DAYS where the characters and dialogue, while fast-paced and clever as usual, are just a second... or perhaps a mere moment... off. And in that, since Woody only narrated DAYS, it's the first where the man himself seems a few years too old to play the same "nebbish" character... It's like he's doing an imitation of himself, and kind of peters out in the process (after all it takes a lot of youthful energy to be so doomed and neurotic)...

His films usually have no empty spaces wherein one forgots what they're watching. Even his best work, from ANNIE HALL to CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS, leave the viewer exhausted, if only from laughing or smiling (or thinking) too much.... FOG however sporadically loses touch within its own story and at times the actors seem directionless. And as strong and infectious Woody is a writer, sometimes his "guest stars" here seem to be desperately improvising (especially Johns Cusack and Malkovich... although they're also doing Woody impressions); on the other hand, the fact it's not as downright hilarious as his 1970's films also means it's that much more laid-back and subtle. Not a bad thing. Despite being about a killer on the loose, it's one of his most relaxing features. And Mia Farrow steals the show by not seeming like she's acting at all.

SMALL TIME CROOKS

Year: 2000
Rating: **1/2

Without giving credit, Woody Allen basically remakes LARCENY INC. where, in that Edward G. Robinson B&W crime-caper, thieves dig from underneath their strategically purchased suitcase store to a bank: The store winds up making more money than they'd have stolen, and Woody changes the business to cookies while SMALL TIME CROOKS plays so with many old movie cliches it seems more a parody than a remake...

Woody shifts from his usual neurotic movie-loving intellectual to a contentedly simple-minded ex con (the biggest stretch is when he thinks Humphrey Bogart's gold seeking SIERRA MADRE set classic is titled TREASURE ISLAND). And he's definitely not alone: Wife Tracey Ullman (the cookie-maker) provides the buried lead, especially during a very abrupt second-act shift as LARCENY morphs into MY FAIR LADY as Hugh Grant plays an intellectual art dealer doubling as a very subtle shyster...

Perhaps too genuine to be genuinely crooked, or all that interesting beyond good looks to fool a street savvy dame, he's constantly holding his proper, pompous tongue, giving loaded etiquette lessons to the new-rich ex-stripper, who has no education and even less taste in clothes, furniture — you name it. And while, overall, SMALL TIME CROOKS is a guilty pleasure, there's genuine heart in director/actress Elaine May as Ullman's kooky cousin...

Whether strolling along waterfront walkways from ANNIE HALL and HANNAH AND HER SISTERS or watching TV while admiring James Cagney's Cody Jarrett for loving his infamous mother — Elaine and Woody have far more chemistry (and funnier one-liners) than the frenzied marrieds, whose HONEYMOONERS banter gets annoying, quick. And good news/bad news: Woody and Elaine returned years later, as a married couple in the Amazon Series, CRISIS IN SIX SCENES. But it made this movie seem like MANHATTAN by comparison, or, more fitting, TAKE THE MONEY AND RUN, Woody's first and funniest role as a criminal.

WHATEVER WORKS

year: 2009

rating: *

A hotdog consists of rejected parts of a pig all thrown together and picked up off the butcher's floor. This is Woody Allen's hotdog. Many of the elements are borrowed from past films, like his fourth-wall-breaking first-person-narrating philosophy of life being meaningless and love being luck and everyone is dying and... all that stuff that was once entertaining when Woody Allen was younger, and funny. His patented neurotic-Jewish-Intellectual character is given to Larry David as a chess-instructing codger who marries a gorgeous teenager, Evan Rachel Wood. This entire concept is funnier than any line in the movie; not ha-ha but "Am I actually supposed to buy this" funny. And there are plenty of one-liners but nothing seems to matter: the characters all frolic stupidly before David so he can put them down. Proving again and again he's no Woody Allen. And as a writer, either is Woody Allen anymore.

VICKY CRISTINA BARCELONA

year: 2008

rating: *

The plot is liken to that of a porno: two hot women travel to Barcelona, Spain and meet a studly artist Javier Bardem, and this big lug invites them to bed. One of the friends, Vicky, who is inhibited and structured, doesn't want to hop in the sack with this guy after knowing him for a good twenty seconds. But wild free-spirited Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) has the hots for him. They all travel by plane to his villa (how does this freewheeling artist in a socialist country have so much money without a real job?) and as fate would have it, Cristina gets sick, thus leaving the reluctant Vicky and the artist alone, and eventually they have sex in a park after he woos her by taking her to listen to a Spanish guitar player and Bardem's dangerous ex wife Penelope Cruz, who he had been talking about throughout the movie, and who'd just attempted suicide, and is now going to live in the same house. So now do we finally have a plot? Hardly. This is a complete mess from beginning to end.