As much as I like Woody Allen, he only ever made two really great films, Annie Hall and Manhattan. 

Annie Hall is one of my favourite films, ever. It's definitely one of the most mature, personal films ever made. Allen is able to take all his introspective, obsessive analysis, and all of his neurotic behaviour, and turn it into a wonderfully entertaining film, free from the bitterness that often crept into his work. This is his most idealistic film. It's not only funny, but incredibly poignant. Annie Hall is as meaningful as anything I've seen about relationships. 

Manhattan is far darker and more pessimistic, and has that feeling of bitterness (or dissatisfaction) that I was talking about before, but it remains deeply funny and just as touching, in its own way, as Annie Hall. It looks beautiful, as well. A valentine to the city he loves, as some people have put it.

Other than that, I respect Woody Allen as a writer. Every now and again, he produces a brilliant screenplay -- Broadway Danny Rose or Bullets Over Broadway being two of my favourites. I wouldn't want anyone other than Allen directing those screenplays, like Sturges, the camera is always where it should be, and always captures the performance. I saw a documentary recently where he was talking about his films, and he was incredibly self-critical of himself, and the "anxiety of influence", painting himself as a hack Bob Hope rather than any of the European directors he's tried to emulate. He's pretty frank about the hit and miss nature of his films, and didn't try to excuse that as the result of making a film per year, he was simply honest about it. 

Like most of my favourite directors, he's not eclectic, his films constantly deal with the same themes, but within that oeuvre he's made some really good films about modern relationships. Even if he does make the occassional one that furthers his bad reputation as being neurotic and annoying. The only thing I'll say for him as a director is that he does a better job than anyone else of incorporating his interests into his films, whether it's his great love for Manhattan, or literature, film, art, architecture, jazz, even the Knicks. He really is one of America's great auteurs.




