Fut i i Woody (med al ujævn flid) siden 1935

Woody Allen bliver 80 i dag, TILLYKKE - og anledning af at jeg læser (og læser og læser og læser) Marianne Stidsens anti-kamæleoniske disputats er her to klip fra en af mine absolutte yndlingsfilm, Zelig:

Ikke længere meget krudt i Woody (eller betydeligt blur)

Velgørende, ved siden af danske la-la-anmeldelser, a denne virtuost vitriolske PRÆCISE krtik af Woody Allens nye, mildest talt uoplagte film Magic in the Moonlight signeret Village Voice'y Alan Scherstuhl (også godt (ondt) kritikernavn - også (god) ond overskrift: It's Been A Year Already?")

(...) as the stars roam those gardens and vistas in their jaunty flapper couture, the story feels shapeless, un-tailored, defiantly off the rack.
Magic in the Moonlight's mystery is pedestrian and predictable, and its lovers -- Colin Firth and Emma Stone -- fall for one another for no reason other than they happen to be the leads in a Woody Allen movie. Everyone declaims the film's meager themes, as if we're watching the actors' what's-my-motivation? prep work rather than their final performances. Even Stone and Firth speaking Allen's lumpish dialogue is something like getting down a mouthful of oatmeal. Occasionally, an actor will shape a line with the hopeful sharpness of a joke, which suggests that someone on set may have been telling them that the film is a comedy. (...)
At one point, midway through, Stanley becomes convinced she does have some ability to contact a spirit realm, which for him means science can no longer be trusted and that maybe there is a God, and on and on. He calls a press conference to announce this and introduce her to the world; it's the movie's biggest laugh, as, for some reason, the reporters questions are all directed at him.
Such uncertain, ill-considered scene craft is a hallmark of Allen's late-late period. But I can say this for that sequence: It's the one thing in Magic in the Moonlight that doesn't feel dispiritingly familiar. Allen's habitual productivity -- a movie a year, whether he has something to say or not -- has made his films something more like rituals than events. Last year in these pages Stephanie Zacharek compared going to see Allen's annual offering to checking in on an elderly relative you hope is having a good day. A trick I've picked up is always to try to get such a relative to tell a story you haven't heard before. Is it too much to ask the same of one of the world's most distinguished filmmakers?

- åh, ja, tristhed over auteurundergang! Her et klip fra en. så vidt jeg husker, god, flosset Allen-film, Deconstructing Harry, med en ulykkeligt utydelig ROBIN WILLIAMS, som nu forbandet nok er helt væk:

Marcelløst

Sigende nok er Marcel Duchamp ikke inkluderet i den fundamentalt godmodige og uspændende avantgarde-revy  (the Fitzgeralds, Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, Gertrude Stein, Luis Bunuel, Man Ray, Salvador Dali (klart filmens højdepunkt: Adrian Brody med moustache fablende om næsehorn)) i Woody Allens mildt underholdende Midnight in Paris - men hvem skulle have spillet ham? Hvem SKAL spille ham i en drømt biopic - titel? hvad med Readymade!? - instrueret af fx Wes Anderson eller Michel Gondry? Enten Crispin Glover, der ligner, eller allerhelst Jim Carrey, der slet ikke ligner, men vil være SÅ god til at tygge hårdt i piben, mens han sidder på et parisisk hustag og spiller skak med en nøgen kvinde (der ER gået op ad trappen).

Woodys regn, vores regn (som vi gerne vil sælge til Jørgen)

Det regnede i Paris, da Woody Allens Midnight in Paris sluttede. Det regnede i København, da vi kom ud af biografen, og modsat Owen Wilson i filmen syntes vi ikke, at det var fedt, eller rettere sagt, det syntes vi først, at det var, da vi havde fundet ly under voldsomt betrommede parasoller på Nytorv, og så syntes vi faktisk, at det var ret fedt, men heldigvis behøvede vi ikke at sige det til et kamera, igen og igen og igen, ligesom Owen, kun hvis vi råbte det i kor: DET ER FEDT, NÅR DET REGNER I KØBENHAVN, og Jørgen Leth stod bag kameraet, ville det være en slags i orden.