WOODY ALLEN
“My one regret in life is that I am not someone else”
If there were an Oscar for self-deprecating modesty and pessimistic honesty, then it would permanently be in the home of the once titled Allen Konningsberg, known to the world as Woody Allen. For decades, his acerbic wit and semi-observational humour has been at the forefront of the comedic conscience, on both sides of the Atlantic.
Of course, Allen has never been a fan of Awards Ceremonies and the like, famously saying that collecting three Academy Awards for masterpiece Annie Hall (best screen play, best picture and, of course, best Director,) had made no difference to him whatsoever. Almost prophetically, in the very same film, he stressed the meaninglessness of such accolades (“best fascist dictator: Adolf Hitler”) and outlined his mantra for life, in a string of seemingly effortless one-liners, too numerous to list. It was in this very picture that he cemented himself as Cinema’s archetypal geeky outsider, whose anally retentive rhetoric and sharp delivery would win him as many enemies as it would fans.
That my rantings on Woody should start with his best-known work is no accident. It is the starting point at which most of us were introduced to his genius, and the movie to which all his others are constantly compared. Yet for a period of well over thirty years, he has produced a great deal of other gems, at a work rate that would put most other directors and writers to shame. At the last count he had written and directed over 35 feature films, nearly all of which serve to highlight why he has become a godlike genius in the eyes of many.
During 35 years of filmmaking, Allen has attempted to set films in a variety of ages and formats. Love and Hate focussed on the setting of the Russian revolution, 1982’s A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy saw him look at turn of the Century Victorian life, whereas the disappointing 1992 offering Shadows and Fog took place in a city akin to that most famously depicted in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep. Yet it is the modern day setting of New York that he is most comfortable in and, ultimately, houses his finest and most impressive films.
The old one liner that ‘you can take the boy out of Manhattan, but you can’t take Manhattan out of the boy’ would have greater resonance if he had ever moved out of the City! For his entire career, any films made outside of his hometown have been few and far between, and have been signposted as a great departure. Yet maybe that’s half the attraction of Woody Allen - the more obsessive amongst us can identify the affection and romanticism that he has for his surroundings, and some of us can even relate to it ourselves.
A great source of adoration, both to loyal devotees and the screaming masses, is the sheer volume of quotable lines that his films contain. There are literally whole web pages listing quotes from his films on the net, and some of his most memorable appear in quotation dictionaries. Musings on sex, love, death and politics usually fill up his films to overflow point, However, the most intriguing and timeless aspect of Woody Allen, and the reason that he is a hero to many, is the honesty that manifests itself within his work. The neurotic and impulsive actions of his characters (because, let’s not forget, he only writes about people) may be seen by some as gimmicks – and have been used as such by many other lesser talents – but the obsession with death and the eternal disappointment of everything stems from the fact that this is exactly what a great deal of people actually worry about. Luckily for Woody, it’s become something of a trademark, but you get the distinct impression that this was never planned. There was just an audience out there, waiting for this stuff and fate, or more correctly his distributors, delivered it to them.
The source if this attraction seems to be that, whereas he has never made a biopic (and one would assume he is far too self conscious and private a person to do it anyway), many of his pictures have been semi-autobiographical. The fact that he always plays an Atheist left wing writer, of Jewish ethnicity, seems to be the first giveaway, but a great deal of his lines are delivered with such authenticity that you sense that there must be something more behind it. Admittedly, his persona has been stretched and more colourfully illustrated than his real life existence, but he writes about this particular person because it’s “what he knows”. Testimony to his skill is that there are few who could argue that they know, or could relate, this character any better.
Much like US sitcom Frasier, it’s often said that you have to be of a certain level of intellect to understand most of the jokes and references that Woody Allen works with and frequently dips into. Whether or not this is the case is a matter of opinion, but it could help to explain why, despite major success and recognition, he is still viewed as a cult figure. Having said that, the constant references to the holocaust, classic authors and death were always going to be too much for the mainstream to stomach. Thankfully for those who appreciate his films, he’s never been able to stomach the mainstream.
For the man who once said “I don't want to achieve immortality through my work... I want to achieve it through not dying”, no achievement is going to be enough. With such an impressive arsenal of past glories in his cannon, his place in the pantheon of Hollywood greats is assured. Yet whilst it is true that long after he has gone, his movies will be there to highlight quite how he conquered the film world, this is despite his successes, not because of them.
Stephen Morse.
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