TolucaGuy

It's been asked, how could anyone not make a deeply moving movie about this subject? There may be a basis for that question, but what Spielberg did was also make a piece of amazing piece of film-making. Despite his phenomnal successes, it seems as if he was hiding his hand at what depths he could demonstrate. After years of awing and amazing us, he now had the skills and power to deliver a most potent work.

To be honest, I haven't seen it since it's initial release. Yet, what I do remember is that Spielberg was able to make a three hour film on the Shoah and make it move a brisk pace without letting up on its impact. That's why it is brilliant.

For years I would see a Woody Allen movie opening weekend or week. I usually went with my friend Patrick, also a big Woody fan. We even stuck it out, despite a serious decline in the quality of his work in the last ten or twelve years. Sure there some pleasant pieces of fluff such as Manhattan Murder Mystery, Bullets Over Broadway and to a lesser degree Small Time Crooks. Alas, I lost Patrick with the Curse of the Jade Scorpion. I stuck it out - but only until 2002's Hollywood Ending.

So even though AE had some decent reviews, I refused to see it in the theatre. (Besides, it's lonely going sitting in a big room watching a movie all alone!) I decided that from now on, it's DVD.

I tried watching AE, but to be honest, I couldn't make it past the first 20 minutes. It is awful. Even though Woody is in the movie as a mentor of sorts to Jason Biggs, the latter takes over and plays Woody a la Kenneth Branaugh in the god awful Celebrity.

It's also really odd that he and his girlfriend played by Christina Ricci both have tastes that are more in line with Allen's (i.e. Cole Porter, Billie Holliday) than people their own age (mid 20's). In fact, their mannerisms and speech are more appropriate for 40 year olds, and then not just any 40 year olds, but 40 year olds from the 70's remembering a better time of their youth.

Allen literally projects himself onto the luckless Biggs who it seems cannot succeed outside of the American Pie series, save for a self-mocking cameo in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. To be honest, I don't like it when Allen does this trick of forcing his leading man to "play" him. It didn't work for John Cusak either, making him a weak link that prevented Bullets from being a truly great movie. Kenneth Branaugh just went down with that other Allen disaster, Celebrity.

As for Ricci, her character is a big pain in the ass for whom tardiness is an art form. It is hard to see why either Biggs' character or his predecessor played by Jimmy Fallon, moved in with her let alone went on more than one date.

In the past, Allen has cribbed scenes and even jokes verbatim from his earlier movies. There were flagrant examples of this in Radio Days. However, the overall excellence of that movie made one overlook the self plagarism. Here it is nothing but a desperate filmmaker trying to recapture the spirit of his best work.

Extra kudos to casting director Feren Casalle. Aside from the superlative breakthrough performance from Charlize Theron, there is also Christina Ricci as her lover. This is a Ricci we've never seen. More vibrant and alive than ever, also displaying a tough veneer that apparently goes down to the core as well.

The film is chock full of terrific character actors, several who play the hapless (and in one case very deserving) victims of Aileen Wournos. Annie Corley is a standout as the woman to whom Selby (Ricci) is in charge of "curing" her of her lesbianism.