Woody Allen
Annie Hall

The film suddenly begins with a close-up of Allen who addresses the audience with a couple of jokes: one is about two old ladies in a nursing home, where one says, "My girl, the food here is really terrible!" and the other responds, "Yes, it's disgusting and such small portions!" An Allenian metaphor for life, which is both terrible and too short. The second joke is attributed to Groucho Marx, paraphrased as, "I would never want to belong to a club that would have someone like me as a member."

Putting oneself front and center is a key for the actor-director to connect with the audience, because Allen feels that many people in the audience share the same problems and feelings. He wants to speak directly and meet them face to face. Often throughout the film, Allen addresses the audience with observations about the story and characters. There is something Godardian in this approach, and in previous films Allen's observations were presented as an aside, following the tradition established by Bob Hope. But the choice is almost "forbidden" in cinema. The observations are key not so much for their comedic effect as for the story's development. "The audience must live the story with me", insists Allen. And it is a winning choice.

"Annie Hall", a film with a blazing and fast start, marks a turning point in the American director's career, leading him to win two Oscars. This film represents a fundamental point for Allen. He sheds the guise of the "clown" and abandons the safety of a film with easy comedy. The search for a deep and intimate turn leads to a film that stands out as a true masterpiece. Written with his friend, screenwriter and director Marshall Brickman, with whom he worked on the script for "Sleeper" and "Manhattan", it is a brilliant and romantic romantic comedy with comical twists and absolutely enlightening directorial ideas. There's an intense and subtle autobiographical vein. Memories mingle in the spectacular settings of the decayed Coney Island (an incredible ocean-side amusement park in the process of being dismantled), the streets of New York, between Brooklyn and Manhattan, and sunny yet stifling Los Angeles.

A 1977 film, wonderfully acted by the frenetic and beautiful Diane Keaton, whose character is an island unto herself, Tony Roberts, in the role of the faithful friend, with incredible appearances such as those of singer Paul Simon, a cameo by an as-yet-unknown Jeff Goldblum, a young Sigourney Weaver, and Marshall McLuhan as himself.

There's a sort of Bergman-esque thread in Allen's choices, as he is a devotee of the late European director Ingmar Bergman. See the choice to open and run the film without a principal soundtrack (in "Manhattan", for example, the film opens with Gershwin's music). All heard music comes from parties or car radios. Also see, in the opening credits, the classical and unfussy font (which will endure from here on in all subsequent films), or again the portrayal of strong female figures (Annie herself). The director takes a step forward toward realistic and profound films and "Annie Hall" is the first sign of a directorial maturity that will define all of Allen's future work.

Throughout the film, the actor and director brilliantly expound, through the character Alvy Singer, personal theories. Unforgettable is the theory on the two existing earthly categories: the horrible (blind, deaf, lame) and the miserable (everyone else). In one scene, the screen is split in two, having a strongly theatrical effect. The two protagonists are at the psychiatrist's, and the viewer can simultaneously perceive the different ways of talking about the same thing from completely distant points of view. The opening scene is amazing, where an adult Alvy Singer dives into childhood memories and interacts with classmates and strict elementary school teachers. In "Annie Hall", there are numerous opportunities for reflection, even though the entire film has a rather fast pace. The film is in this sense rich and dense in dialogues and jokes and mental interaction overlapping with real dialogue between characters (see the subtitle scene while flirting with Annie). The final message, another metaphor of the grotesque man-woman relationship that we cannot do without, is bittersweet, emotionally winning, and deserves one more mention: A guy goes to the doctor in despair "Doctor, my wife thinks she's a chicken" response "Then have her committed" the guy "And who will lay my eggs?"

This is undoubtedly an excellent, unforgettable, and extremely effective film, suitable for a thoughtful and sentimental audience. It has a bit of everything. The dreamlike aspects will astonish you, the love story will touch you, and by the end, you won't know whether it's more appropriate to laugh or cry. A grand Allen.