BEFORE: I got an e-mail yesterday from my cable provider, explaining that my access to the new channels is free for 3 months, and will automatically expire at the end of that period. With access to over a dozen films that I've been looking for, I intend to take full advantage - my guess is that the cable company realized that its customers were missing out on some big films from 2012-2013, and were eventually going to seek out those films on NetFlix or Amazon. This way, everybody wins.
Linking from "Match Point", Scarlett Johansson carries over.
THE PLOT: An American journalism student in London scoops a big story, and begins an affair with an aristocrat as the incident unfurls.
AFTER: More hijinx among the British upper class tonight, and Woody appears again in a mentor role to a younger character (as in "Anything Else") and also performs magic tricks (as in "Shadows and Fog").
I'm regarding the magic tricks, and the ability to speak with a dead character as tonight's contrivances, especially since we've seen them before - the person "disappearing" from a box was also seen in Allen's segment of "New York Stories", and in "Alice", the lead character gets to speak to her deceased boyfriend. But the thing about the contrivances is that they do propel the plot forward, and they were truly necessary here to set everything in motion.
But if there's even a chance that a person is a serial killer, is the best way to get information about them to start seeing them romantically? It's not just about being too close to the story, it's that jumping into bed with someone who might kill his lovers is an all-too-obvious way to get on his list. There simply must have been other avenues to get the required information - they might have taken longer, but they would have been less dangerous.
This is not the first Woody Allen film to deal with murder, but his filmography overall highlights a disturbing trend - what do "Crimes and Misdemeanors", "Manhattan Murder Mystery", "Broadway Danny Rose", and tonight's film have in common? They all feature men killing (or trying to kill) ex-girlfriends or ex-wives - but I can only think of one instance in Woody's films of a woman killing a man. Is this a reflection of reality or some kind of wish-fulfillment? Either way, I think I've found my thesis topic. Add on the wife-beating seen in "The Purple Rose of Cairo", and draw your own conclusions.
But on the whole, I found this was well-organized and didn't contradict itself too often, which I can't say about all of Woody Allen's films.
The suspenseful classical music heard throughout is "In the Hall of the Mountain King", from the Peer Gynt Suite by Edvard Grieg. But I confused the piece with "The Sorcerer's Apprentice", by Paul Dukas, which would have made more narrative sense, considering Woody plays a magician who mentors the lead character. But since both classical pieces feature repetitive music and both build to rousing crescendos, I'm wondering if Woody or his music supervisor also confused the two pieces.
(and cameos from TWO Star Wars actors, who played Gen. Veers in "Empire Strikes Back" and Mon Mothma in "Return of the Jedi"!)
Also starring Hugh Jackman (last heard in "Rise of the Guardians"), Ian McShane (last seen in "Jack the Giant-Slayer"), Julian Glover (last seen in "Troy"), Romola Garai, Charles Dance, with cameos from Caroline Blakiston (last seen in "The Fourth Protocol"), Anthony Head.
RATING: 7 out of 10 Stradivarius violins
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