Then Milestone time. Manhattan Murder Mystery was the first Woody Allen film I saw at the cinema. At, I discovered on opening the dvd box, screen six of the Manchester Odeon on Oxford Road on the 4th February 1994 at 1:10 pm. I still have the ticket:
Look at that old logo. Look at the price! Well, they do say “Please retain this portion”. The anomalous aspect of this is that I don’t remember being in Manchester on that day. I was at university in Leeds. I did go and see my old school friend Richard who was at UMIST at some time during that year and this was a Friday so it’s entirely possible that I went to the cinema whilst I waited for him to finish lectures for the day. Unless we attended the Odeon together. Or this was a different weekend entirely. My mind is blank.
I do remember the second time, which was a week later at the Hyde Park Picture House in Leeds. At the time I was a volunteer at the Studio Theatre at Leeds Metropolitan University and met the director on the way there, so just like the couples going to see Double Indemnity in the film, we went together. It was a house packed with students, certainly busier than any house for a Woody Allen film I’ve experienced since, and everyone enjoyed themselves, laughing all of the way through which is how it should. Perhaps the Odeon had been empty and that’s why it didn’t stick in my memory.
Like Annie Hall, it’s a film which is even funnier now than then because I too have grown some experiences. Having since watched most of the films referenced, I can now laugh along to the Last Year At Marienbad discussion, Double Indemnity and the use of The Lady from Shanghai at the conclusion, of life imitating art.
Now Diane Keaton, how I’ve missed you. With the exception of her sparkling cameo in Radio Days, this was her first film with Woody since 1979’s Manhattan and yet, despite having added some age and having worked with Charles Shyer in the intervening years, so easily does she fit back into his style it’s like she’s never been away. Her part was originally written for Mia and hardly changed but since the film is based on an excised section of Annie Hall, it's fitting that she should be the one to step in, making Manhattan Murder Mystery a kind of alternate reality sequel suggesting what might have happened if Alvy and Annie had stayed together, though without any of the post-modern tricks.
I’d be interested to know how mystery genre fans approach the film; I’m terrible with anything written by Christie or Doyle, never able to work out who the killer will be from the clues being laid out working from hunches always. But Murder is really a how done it; Carol knows who the killer is from the off – she’s trying to prove that he has done something nefarious and how he did it which gives it a different complexion and as Roger Ebert notes in his review (video below) most of the clues fall in their lap (incidentally the clip also includes an outrageous spoiler!).
The visual and improvisational style of Husbands and Wives continues here. As the camera darts about the audience is kept on a constant state of awareness as we’re forever wanting to see what’s happening off screen. There’s also an interesting shot as the Liptons are leaving their apartment building were he’s complimenting her on what she’s wearing and it looks like the actors are out of character getting ready to enter the scene and he’s left it in. Many of the scenes play out across very long takes but only now and then are you aware of the actors going on and off script. There are a couple of moments when the camera is off Woody and following Diane about their apartment when a joke seems like it’s been inserted in post-production but it’s largely seamless.
So at a time when you might assume Woody would be winding down his ambition especially as his budget’s shorten he’s still experimenting. To an extent by then he’d become Teflon coated. His films always made a loss at the cinema yet it was almost as though Hollywood couldn’t live with itself if Woody Allen wasn’t allowed to continue making films to entertain them. After two films with Columbia/Tri-Star, he’d spend the rest of the decade working for the Weinsteins at Miramax.
The reason seems to be consistency. Woody, at least until this point hadn’t made a particularly bad film. September and Another Woman were slightly ponderous, but all of them were at least interesting and didn’t fall into the realms of cliché. I still think that’s probably true, but as one of his characters might say, let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
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