arturus

This is a lovely little film, extravagant in its visuals, with Paris serving as another character in the story, looking glorious of course. The photography alone is worth the price of admission. The premise is charming and is executed in a believable way. The filming of it is simple and effective, with no tricks, just as straightforward realism.

The contemporary characters are out of Allen's stock barrel of characters. The two leads could be played by Allen and Diane Keaton, but they are now too old to play them, so the young actors serve as stand-ins for the two originals. Wilson has an interesting face but is too good-looking and too WASP-y to play the "Allen character". He does a spot on imitation of Allan's quirky mannerisms, vocal and physical, in this role. I wish he hadn't. I think a more original take on the "Allen character" might have been more effective. Here, he just seems like an imitation, and not a believable one.

The writing is fair. The dialogue is Allen's usual "realistic" way of making his characters speak, which never seems like the way people talk, just someones Idea of how they talk.

The best part of this film for me are the time travel scenes, populated by all of the main character's heroes from the past. They could be a dream, but they are executed with total realism. These roles are written and acted with more success than the 2010 characters, which all seem as if they actually belong in the 1970s, not the 2010s. All of the great people the hero meets in these episodes are done quite well, except for a stilted Hemingway (but how else could you portray a character who was mostly bluster and defensive pretense in real life?) Kathy Bates is the real standout as Gertrude Stein. She takes an underwritten part and creates a portrait of the iconic figure not at all as a caricature of her, but as real, breathing person, intelligent, savvy and believable.

The real problem with this charming film is that it's too long for its slight story. This might have been better as a short or as one episode in a multiple-story film, which Allen has done before. Here, about halfway through, it starts to drag and you begin to wonder...

I think this is a fine little picture, but not a great one, and not one of Allen's best. I think it is garnering the praise it's been getting because it's superb in contrast to most of the drek that's being released right now.

I've only seen this film a few times when it was shown on Showtime in the mid 80s. It's a chilling and realistic film about children in a suburban school caught in the middle of what they suspect is a real nuclear attack, although the reality of it is never actually confirmed. I was impressed with the quality of the writing, the direction and the solid acting of the cast, all prominent New York actors then, with good local reputations for their work no stage and in 50s television, but none of them stars yet. What thrilled me most was that I had known two of the child actors, the two Howard brothers, playing brothers in the film, and seeing them again looking just as they did then was a moving experience for me.

I saw this as a teenager and even then I was deeply impressed with everything about it, the writing, the casting, the superb performances. I thought that Dick and Paula would certainly become the Lunt and Fontanne of my generation, a gifted married couple who could play comedy brilliantly, and drama, too! But CBS never gave this show the slot it deserved or the promotion it needed. It got rave reviews and had a devoted if small audience, but it was canceled after only one season. I liked it so much I made (audio) recordings of several episodes, just for the writing and to hear the way these two, Benjamin and Prentiss, played off of each other. Sheer brilliance!