Interiors

In the 2001 film, In The Bedroom, Sissy Spacek plays Ruth Fowler, a mother grieving her murdered son. While visiting his grave, she speaks with her priest and the two discuss the pain, the sensation of losing a child. Ruth is a music teacher. She equates the feeling of loss  to “Like a rest in music. No sound but so loud.” After watching Interiors, I kept coming back to this quote when trying to describe the experience. It is a quiet film, painfully so. Amidst the soft tones of the visual design, lack of musical score, the still camera, and intense conversations lies a burning, quiet rage. Sandwiched between two of his most-acclaimed films of the 1970s, Annie Hall and Manhattan, Interiors is a broad departure from most of the movies by Woody Allen, let alone the distinction commonly made between his early comedies and later work. A movie like Annie Hall dealt with dramatic themes like love and loss in a more mature way than Sleeper, for example, while still veering towards the fantastic. It was, at its heart, a comedy with dramatic moments. By contrast, Interiors is a stark drama, devoid of any comedic goal, closely examining the lives of a family in a crisis. It is a very precise film, exacting and crushing in its approach.

Three sisters are left to pick up the pieces after their father announces he’s leaving their mother for, what he calls, a “trial separation.” Their mother, Eve, has suffered with mental illness for quite some time. She’s unstable, often hysterical. In an attempt to bring order to her life, she spends her time meticulously decorating the interiors of her home. The crux of the film centers on the siblings and their attempts to cope with their marriages, inner-struggles, and the family’s tumult— specifically their mother’s issues. Renata, a poet, has been struck with writer’s block as she grapples with fears of her own mortality. Joey, the father’s favorite, has all the ambition and emotion of a great artist, without the necessary talent to express it. Flyn, the lightest of the bunch, is an actress of soaps and day-time movies. Not just a departure from Woody’s previous work in terms of tone, it’s also a detour from his style as a filmmaker. The movie is made of long, ponderous shots. The camera remains frozen, like the rest of the artfully placed decor, as characters move in and out of the frame. The art design is full of muted tones, icy grays, beiges, and whites. Everything from the sets to the wardrobe is devoid of any vibrant color. Reflected in these cold, obsessively arranged rooms in which the film transpires, is the mother’s grip on the lives of the others. They dress, no doubt subconsciously, to appease her. Everything fits into the world she’s arranged.

Many were caught off-guard by Allen’s sudden dramatic dalliance. I’ve often quoted from Vincent Canby’s reviews of Woody’s films in the New York Times and it’s obvious he was a fan of his work. For Interiors, however, Canby felt he’d traded his artistic strengths to mimic his cinematic heroes with lesser success. “It’s almost as if Mr. Allen had set out to make someone else’s movie, say a film in the manner of Mr. Bergman, without having any grasp of the material, or first-hand, gut feelings about the characters,” he writes. “They seem like other people’s characters, known only through other people’s art.” Bert Cardullo, a Professor of Media and Communication wrote in the collection, The Films of Woody Allen: Critical Essays, the film “represents a feeble attempt to escape from his authentic self.” In the book Woody Allen on Woody Allen, the filmmaker discusses such reactions to the film. “People were annoyed at me— their lovable comic figure— for having the pretension to try something like this.” It wasn’t all doom and gloom for the movie. Another long-time fan of Allen, Roger Ebert, saw promise. “Allen, whose comedies have been among the cheerful tonics of recent years, is astonishingly assured in his first drama,” he writes. “Allen treats these themes in scenes that have an elegant economy of expression.” In addition to garnering four nominations at the 1978 Academy Awards (two for Allen’s writing and direction), the film was also quite popular for the post-Annie Hall crowd.

Allen was met with no resistance from the studio when he pitched the somber story. “Arthur Krim was the head of United Artists at that time,” says Allen. “He just said, ‘You’ve made some funny films, and now you feel like you want to try something else. You’ve earned it. Go ahead!’” In an interview for the Chicago Sun-Times, Allen describes the opening run of the film:

“I just came past the theater, on Third Avenue,” he said, settling into the corner of a large sofa. “The lines were still there. ‘Annie Hall’ set the house record at the theater, but ‘Interiors’ has broken Annie’s record all three weeks. Amazing. I was willing to accept the fact that even if the film turned out well nobody would come to see it, because it was serious and people expected comedies from me. So we opened it very simply, simple ads, one small theater, and now it’s doing all this business.”

Despite a number of positive reviews, nominations, and the initial buzz surrounding the movie, Allen considers it “a mixed critical success” in the States. “This was the first time that I came up with a significant amount of negative press.” Time has been more favorable to Interiors, distanced from the context of coming on the heels of a movie like Annie Hall. Left Field Cinema aptly describes it as an overlooked gem. “Interiors was what I wanted to do and the best I could do at the time,” explains Allen. “I wanted to start to work in dramatic films a little bit. I didn’t want to work in them most of the time, but I wanted it to be part of my production.”

The virtues of the film are easily extolled— “It is cool, contemplative, intricately structured, a flawless miniature, with a pale beauty of its own,” writes Neil Sinyard in The Films of Woody Allen. The cinematography is starkly beautiful, achieving a cold stillness that still manages to draw in the viewer. The acting, as well, stands out from Geraldine Page, the unstable matriarch (for which she earned an Oscar nomination), to Diane Keaton. The last time Woody Allen’s lens was focused on her she was the vibrant Annie Hall. The first glimpse of her in Interiors shows a ragged woman, unsure of herself, her talent, her purpose in the universe, putting a hand to the window of her mother’s house as if trapped inside like a prisoner. If ever two films could show her range as an actress it’s stacking Annie Hall alongside this picture.

The characters of the film, however, are almost unanimously unlikeable, save for Joey’s boyfriend ably played by Sam Waterson and Pearl, the father’s bold, red-robed new love interest. Renata’s plight is relatable but she’s selfish and her talent as a writer is never displayed in the film— one must take the movie’s word for it. Joey is a character I could relate to on many levels— especially her frustration of having emotions yet doubting the ability to express them artistically. However, I don’t share her bitterness, her cruelty towards others. It was frustrating to see a character like Joey, and my sympathy for her, dashed away because she treats people so terribly. Allen was attempting to convey an overwhelming bleakness and in that he succeeds. There is a burdensome feeling of dread as Eve spirals further into darkness and the rest of the family is along for the ride. I expected to hate this film after hearing things about it over the years as Woody’s failed attempt to play it straight. But there’s real talent at play here, thoughtful filmmaking and storytelling. It’s staggering how a film, that’s essentially people in barren rooms talking in hushed voices, can feel so powerful.

Annie Hall

This is a big one. Annie Hall is a major film, not just in terms of the Woody Allen filmography, but personally as well. More often than not it’s a favorite amongst Woody fans, it’s the lone “Best Picture” Oscar winner amidst his 48 films to date, and is a departure from what he’d done before. If his early movies were focused primarily on making people laugh, Annie Hall marks the beginning of films that strive to do much more. But, of course, there are still plenty of laughs along the way. My experience with the film goes back to high school when my friend introduced me to it and Woody Allen in general. When the two of us started the Film Appreciation Club after school (yes, we were that cool) it was the first movie we played. For years, I lived with an Annie Hall poster on my bedroom wall and it’s the first movie I show someone when they ask about Woody Allen. Critics at the time of its 1977 debut were favorable, citing a level of growth and maturity in the director. Canby at the New York Times writes, “Because Mr. Allen has his roots as a writer of one-liners and was bred in television and nightclubs, standing up, it’s taken us quite a while to recognize just how prodigiously talented he is.” Roger Ebert, who was often fond of Allen’s early work, was glowing in his original review of the film stating, “Annie Hall is a comedy, yes, and there are moments in it as funny as anything Woody has done, but the movie represents a growth on Allen’s part. From a filmmaker who would do anything for a laugh, whose primary mission seemed to be to get through the next five minutes, Allen has developed in Sleeper, Love and Death, and this film into a much more thoughtful and (is it possible?) more mature director.” Last year, Slant Magazine described Annie Hall as being “made of such durable stuff” that its appeal goes beyond Allen fans and even his detractors. In 2002, Ebert took a second-look at the movie and found it held up after all these years, maybe getting even better with age. “Watching it again, 25 years after its April 1977 premiere, I am astonished by how scene after scene has an instant familiarity.” And there is something very comforting about the film, especially coming back to watch it again as I did for this project. It’s a movie I’ve seen many times but, like a comfy sweater or your favorite meal or a song from your childhood, there’s an indescribable niceness in returning for more. Superficially, the film might appear to be just a romantic comedy done Woody-style. However, while it is a story about love and loss, it defies conventions in terms of storytelling as well as filmmaking techniques.

Annie Hall began life as a scrapped murder mystery with Alvy Singer and the titular Annie embroiled in an amateur gumshoe adventure. Woody returns to this idea when he and Diane Keaton reunite in the 1990s for Manhattan Murder Mystery. At some point in the writing process, the focus shifted to what was most-interesting, the relationship between Alvy and Annie, and the murder subplot was dropped. The final cut of the film begins after their relationship ends and jumps back and forth in time from Alvy’s childhood, to the waning days of his relationship with Annie, to the day they met, and back again. In the hands of another filmmaker, the movie might have followed the typical boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back, the end structure. But Annie Hall seeks to defy expectations not just in the story it’s telling but how it’s told. In the first shot of the film, Alvy “stands in front of an orangey sort of backdrop and tells us, the movie audience, the joke about two women at a Catskill resort.” It’s about as direct as it gets, obliterating the fourth-wall in the first moments, telling us two jokes that summarize the themes of the film as well as his views on life. “This, says Alvy Singer, is just about the way he feels about life,” writes critic Vincent Canby. “It’s not great—in fact, it’s pretty evenly divided between the horrible and the miserable—but as long as it’s there, he wants more.” This is just the first of many filmmaking flights of fancy Allen plays with throughout the film. Amidst this very sincere movie about a relationship between two people are surreal breaks with reality such as conjuring a famous director to settle an argument, children addressing the camera to tell you that, as adults, they’ve grown up to be “into leather”, Annie’s personified consciousness leaving her body to do some sketches as she’s bored during sex, and even a digression into an animated sequence. “This is a movie that establishes its tone by constantly switching between tones: The switches reflect the restless mind of the filmmaker, turning away from the apparent subject of a scene to find the angle that reveals the joke,” writes Ebert. Yet, despite these detours from realism, the film manages to maintain its sincerity. It’s a remarkable juggling act. Writing for Slant, Jaime Christley writes, “Even in its present form… the film still shouldn’t work; its a-chronological structure, as applied to a charming romantic comedy, was unprecedented.” But, as Allen explains, there was method to this movie-making madness. In regards to the opening shot he says, “I felt instinctively that a picture where I address the audience directly and talked about myself personally would interest them, because I felt many of the people in the audience had the same feelings and the same problems. I wanted to talk to them directly and confront them.” And just as it did with Play It Again, Sam, the story deals with the interplay between fantasy and reality, often blending them together.

“Well, two things happened on Annie Hall. One was that I reached some kind of a personal plateau where I felt I could put the films that I had done in the past behind me. And I wanted to take a step forward toward more realistic and deeper films. The other thing was that I met Gordon Willis. And Gordon was a very important teacher to me, from a technical point of view. He showed me things about camera and lighting; it was a real turning point for me in every way. From then on, I really count Annie Hall as the first step toward maturity in some way in making films.” -Woody Allen

“It has been said, that if I have any one big theme in my movies it’s got to do with the difference between reality and fantasy,” says Allen. “I think what it boils down to, really, is I hate reality. I think it comes from my childhood where I constantly escaped into the cinema.” Whether the viewer takes Alvy’s memories of childhood at face-value, for example, is irrelevant because whether or not it happened as he remembers matters less than it being his particular version of things. It’s his memory of it and the struggle between that memory and reality is an experience we all share. After all, how often do we remember things as we want to and not necessarily how they actually happened? The film, as a whole, is his recollection of his relationship with Annie as he tries to figure out where it all went wrong and the tug-and-pull between fantasy and reality persists.

While standing on-line at a movie, Alvy and Annie run afoul of an intellectual blowhard, a man pontificating about films in an annoying way particularly reserved for Woody Allen movies. To settle an argument, Alvy produces the director being discussed from behind a nearby standee. “Boy if life were only like this,” Alvy addresses the audience. Of course, it’s not how life really works but it’s Alvy’s wish that it were. The same idea applies to his relationship with Annie. If only one could suddenly conjure something out of thin air to fix the problems that manifest themselves during a relationship. It’s never any one thing that dooms a relationship, as seen here, but a collection of things, a growing apart, a loss of momentum. “Love fades,” says a passerby. It’s a depressing concept for Alvy.

Due to the structure of the film, we first meet Annie long into their relationship. The issues between the couple are already present— “Ok, fine, my sexual problem,” she shouts during a discussion. It isn’t until later in the film we’re witness to the first meeting between Annie and Alvy and the contrast becomes apparent. Like most relationships, it didn’t start out the way we first saw it. Annie’s sweet and nervous and, though he hides it well, Alvy’s much the same way. Throughout the film, Annie changes as a character, grows as a person. Her first time singing at a night club is marred by her insecurities, she can barely sing over the din of the crowd. Allen frames the shot perfectly, including a support beam of the building in the foreground, making it look as if Annie is singing to a wall. It isn’t until later in the film, Annie sings again, an unforgettable take on “It Seems Like Old Times” and her development as a singer, person, and character is apparent. She’s grown. Annie Hall, the character, is perhaps the most-remarkable accomplishment in the film. Diane Keaton’s performance, for which she won an Oscar, is a pitch-perfect blend of shy naiveté in the beginning and a steady growth of assuredness in herself and exasperation with Alvy. When she appears near the end of the film at a last-ditch meeting with Alvy in California, she exudes confidence, radiates beauty— you find yourself wanting exactly what Alvy wants. The creation of the character is a high-water mark for Allen as a writer.

“When I first started writing, I could only write from the man’s point of view,” says Woody. “But somewhere along the line— I don’t know why or what happened— it switched. And suddenly, for some reason, I started to write basically from the woman’s point of view all the time. Maybe it had to do with psychoanalysis, maybe it had to do with my interpersonal relationship with Diane. I mean, Annie Hall was the first good woman’s role I ever wrote. A really good one.”

Strong female roles have since become a staple for Allen. “In the span of more than 40 of Mr. Allen’s films, including “Annie Hall,” “Hannah and Her Sisters” and “Vicky Cristina Barcelona,” strong and memorable women have become as much a hallmark of his movies as the venerable Windsor font in their credits,” writes David Itzkoff. “These are women who dominate and who are subjugated, who struggle and love and kvetch and fall apart, but they rarely conform to simplistic stereotypes.” Scarlett Johannson, star of several Woody Allen films, says Allen “appreciates the versatility of the heroine, her ability to be both doe and lioness. His openness to the possibility that a woman can be both hunter and hunted allows him to explore more deeply the complexity of the female spirit.” And that, in many ways, is what gives Annie Hall her authenticity throughout the film. She grows while, by and large, Alvy stays the same. It’s a problem to which many people can relate. Relationships end and how many times has one person said to the other “I haven’t changed— you have” not realizing that’s part of the problem?

The ending of Annie Hall, much like the rest of the film, is a-typical of a romantic comedy. Amidst a flash of scenes from the relationship like the notes and pictures we stuff inside a shoebox, we’re left with the couple departing one another, the sound of the city taking over, and life moving on. All at once it’s familiar, depressing, and something we must accept. Like a failed relationship in our own lives it’s a bitter pill and the moment has a deafening ring of truth. I knew once I started this project, watching all of his movies and writing about them in a year, every thing would be all right if I just got to Annie Hall. It’s a taste of thing to come with high-highs like Manhattan amidst low-lows (I’m looking at you, Curse of the Jade Scorpion). Developing…

Love and Death

Sleeper, the Woody Allen film that precedes Love and Death, ends with this exchange between reluctant hero Miles and his companion in the rebellious underground, Luna.

Luna: You don’t believe in science, and you also don’t believe that political systems work, and you don’t believe in God, huh?
Miles: Right.
Luna: So then, what do you believe in?
Miles: Sex and death— two things that come once in a lifetime. But at least after death, you’re not nauseous.

These final lines of dialogue segue perfectly into Love and Death, eschewing in many of the themes that pervade the send-up of the Russian epic with the same brand of neurotic wit and charm. While Sleeper sent us two-hundred years into the future to a dystopian nightmare, Love and Death makes a dramatic u-turn, set in 19th-century Russia, during the Napoleonic War. Boris, played by Woody, is the cowardly runt of three brothers. Before being sent off to the front-lines, Boris learns that his cousin Sonja (Diane Keaton), the woman he loves, has eyes for his older, stronger, dumber brother Yvon. Boris and Sonja share a mutual intellect and their philosophical discussions of morality re-enforce the absurdity of their presence in the film. While everyone else fits the world of Love and Death as uncultured Russian peasants, Boris and Sonja neither look nor act the part. But just as Woody’s medieval court jester character in Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* But Were Afraid To Ask felt out-of-place with his trademark rimmed-glasses and modern-day one-liners, Boris and Sonja’s anachronisms are part of the joke. Returning from the war a hero, Boris marries Sonja after winning a duel, much to her chagrin. Their marriage eventually matures, as she grows to love him, and the two hatch a scheme to assassinate Napoleon.

Love and Death conjures up plot comparisons from the greats of Russian literature— War and Peace, most notably, as well as Crime and Punishment. Moreover, the film plays off its influences proudly, compacting as many references to the likes of Ingmar Bergman, T.S. Eliot, and Sergei Eisenstein, as possible given the modest run-time. Tolstoy, the morality of murder in a Godless existence, the nature of love— these are heavy things that could bog down a comedy were it not handled masterfully, evened out by Woody’s ability to harken back to his humorous heroes of old.  “Not only was Woody able to question religious and philosophical concerns within the comic framework of Love and Death,” writes Jeff Stafford for TCM, “but he was able to pay homage to some of his favorite films: a battlefield hawker who sells blinis to the troops recalls Harpo Marx in Duck Soup, a dueling scene appears modeled on a Bob Hope routine in Monsieur Beaucaire.” Just as Sleeper was able to mix the classic slapstick of the silent film-era with a futuristic setting, Love and Death manages a similar feat, pitting the gravity of a period piece against Woody’s goofball contemporary jokes. Benjamin Craig, an editor for Propeller, has this to say about the juxtaposition of big themes and big laughs:

“Where the literary influences create complexity and ask the viewer to contemplate “big ideas,” the comedic influences temper those same impulses. Both Hope and the Marx Brothers offer quick laughs. Allen reassures his audience: I’ve just asked you to think about your mortality, but don’t worry, here’s some funny wordplay.”

Allen felt the same way. In a 1975 interview with Seventeen, he said, “I felt [Love and Death] ran the risk of people saying, “It’s funny, but a little heavy going.” I know I can make a picture that people will laugh at, and that’s the primary thing to do. To make a comedy that has a message but isn’t funny enough, that’s a big mistake. Better if it’s very funny and doesn’t say anything. The ideal thing is to be funny and also say something significant.”

Above: Bergman’s “The Seventh Seal” and the dance of death. Below: Woody dashes off to the Great Beyond.

The jokes of Love and Death work even if somebody isn’t familiar with something as obscure as Battleship Potemkin, an early 20th-century Russian propaganda film, or Woody dancing off with Death as a nod to the final shot of Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal. But knowing them certainly helps clue viewers in to something greater at work. Allen “is also an avid reader and filmgoer and a master technician, and it’s these aspects of him that most inform the quality of his films,” writes Benjamin Craig. Many of the jokes reference influential, culturally significant works of film and literature but are dressed up as low-brow wisecracks played for yucks. It’s a strange blend, unique to Woody Allen.

Above: Bergman’s “Persona” Below: Woody’s playful homage.

Love and Death is the last of Woody’s early style of comedies. In many ways, he’s taken the concept of a film addressing deep-rooted philosophical conundrums wrapped up in a zany comedy about as far as it can go. The greater questions being asked in the film, at times, butt-up against the confines of the tone and style. Perhaps it’s why his movies take a stylistic turn, focusing on similar themes but with a more developed, mature form of storytelling. Just as Sleeper managed to segue perfectly into Love and Death, so too does this film work as a stepping-stone towards Annie Hall.

Sleeper

In 1973, Woody premiered the latest in his series of quick-witted, zany physical comedies. Sleeper is a sci-fi film with a nostalgic bent, having just as much to say about the contemporary world as it does about the future, as well as the past. In the book On Being Funny: Woody Allen and Comedy by Eric Lax, Woody is quoted as saying, “I want[ed] to mix it up. I don’t think a person should make a single kind of film. I think that’s a mistake.” While the futuristic world of Sleeper, complete with totalitarian government ala 1984 is a far cry from the present-day setting of Bananas, I find there are many similarities between the films. Like Bananas, Woody is unwittingly thrust into a revolution to overthrow an oppressive government. Going in for routine surgery in 1973, health food store owner Miles Monroe awakes 200-years later to discover he’s been frozen all this time (apparently some complications arose in the operating room) and thawed out into a world with an oppressive government and a rebellious underground seeking its annihilation.

Throughout his career, Woody has revisited themes like love and betrayal so it’s no surprise to see him reexamining ideas like the dangers of political fanaticism. Sleeper is a refinement of the political ambitions first set-forth in Bananas. It’s a more realized film, showcasing Woody’s talents as a writer with an outlandish sci-fi plot, as well as his penchant for physical comedy. The famous scene where Woody masquerades as a housekeeping robot is the stuff of Film Appreciation classes. With Sleeper, Allen is growing as a filmmaker. In the 1973 New York Times review, Vincent Canby writes, “The fine madness of Take the Money and Run and Bananas, which were largely illustrated extensions of his nightclub routines, is now also apparent in the kind of slapstick comedy that can only be done in films. When Woody wrestles with a butterscotch pudding mix that won’t stop rising, when he runs afoul of an ill-fitting flying belt, or when he attempts to clone the entire body of the dead dictator from all that remains of the dictator (a nose), you realize that the stand-up comedian has at last made an unequivocal transition to the screen.”

Sleeper is an ambitious film, especially for Woody Allen. The dystopian future of 2173 is believably depicted with the aid of top-notch location scouting (such as the famous “Sleeper” house near Boulder, Colorado) and incredible work from the props department including a field of giant vegetables, a space suit that makes Woody look like a giant rubber pear, a metallic orb that delights its holders like a drug, and much more.

As a quick aside for some Woody Allen trivia, it’s worth noting this movie appears to be the first to include the trademark “Woody” film titles, complete with Windsor font and still title cards (as opposed to scrolling ones). Also worth noting, like the character of Miles Monroe, Woody is an accomplished Jazz clarinetist. For the soundtrack to Sleeper, Woody performed with the New Orleans Funeral and Marching Orchestra and Preservation Jazz Hall Band. The sleek visuals of the far-flung future juxtapose with the rag-time musical score, creating a movie that looks sci-fi while feeling like the silent-era movies of yesteryear. In his review of the film, Roger Ebert declared that Woody “gives us moments in “Sleeper” that are as good as anything since the silent films of Buster Keaton.” And indeed that’s sort of the trick Sleeper plays on the audience. It’s dressed up like a futuristic sci-fi chase movie but, when you get down to it, Woody is paying homage to the movies he loved growing up. His performance is a love-letter to the great physical comedy auteurs like Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Groucho Marx. Yet, despite being set in the future and done in the comedic stylings of the past, Sleeper has a lot to say about the culture of 1973 and where Woody feared it could go.

Being a relic of a by-gone era affords Allen the opportunity to take shots at his contemporaries, telling future researchers Richard Nixon, “was president, but whenever he left the White House the Secret Service counted the silverware” and watching Howard Cosell was punishment for crimes against the State in his time. Taking a page from the likes of science-fiction authors like Arthur C. Clarke or Aldous Huxley, Allen’s future world offers modern conveniences like domestic robots that do chores and cook meals in exchange for personal freedom. It’s not so bad, on the surface, and Miles’ time within the confines of the dystopian society don’t look all that unpleasant, complete with automated Catholic confessionals. Like Huxley’s novel, Brave New World, citizens are pacified by recreational drugs and sex is nothing more than a pastime rather than a form of intimacy thanks to the aid of machines like the Orgasmatron. Yet it’s a message regarding the dangers of technology that prevails, it being no small coincidence the voice actor for the computers in Sleeper are done by Douglas Rain, the same man who gave life to HAL 9000, the murderous AI in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Likewise, Diane Keaton’s character Luna bears a striking resemblance to the doomed Lenina of Brave New World, embracing the sexual liberation and pampering her allegiance to The Leader affords.

Sleeper is an example of what’s great about being a Woody Allen fan. You’re given such an interesting mix of silent-era comedy with slip-and-fall gags with Dixieland playing in the background against the backdrop of a harsh future dystopia. And yet, he still manages to sneak in a reference to A Streetcar Named Desire with Woody as Blanche and Diane as Stanley. It’s hilarious and nobody else makes movies quite like this. Writing for TOR, Ryan Britt posits “it is with Sleeper where his ability to blend what was then his trademark slapstick comedy style with a seemingly off-the-rack science fiction premise, demonstrates his true acrobatics as both a writer and a director.” The fact that Woody can display his influences so prominently and still make a movie that feels like one of his own is remarkable. After all, slipping on a banana peel is an old joke but, when the banana is genetically-modified with gigantism, it’s a fresh take.

If Sleeper falters anywhere it’s with the latter half of the plot which reveals itself to be nothing more than a typical chase movie, ending abruptly with several threads left untied. The chemistry between Woody Allen and Diane Keaton continues to develop on-screen, with the actress honing her own comedic talent. Plot issues persist in these early Allen comedies but mostly because everything is meant to serve the comedy and, thankfully, the jokes work.