brought to you by Zee MGM.
Actor, director, screenwriter, and playwright Woody Allen redefined film comedy during the 1970s, bringing a new measure of sophistication and personal complexity to the form. His movies while commenting on recurring subjects such as art, religion, and romance — put a knowing, confessional spin on the anxieties of contemporary audiences, telescoping their fears and concerns through his own mordantly neurotic onscreen persona. With his own, unconventional narrative style, he infused the screen-comedy form with unprecedented substance and depth.
This October, Zee MGM brings you the most acclaimed hits of Woody Allen starting with his 1977’s Academy Award-winning Annie Hall on October 8. A major commercial hit as well as a critical success, Annie Hall announced a new era of intelligence and complexity in American comedies
Following it up on October 15th is the penetrating Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), which scored three Academy Award nominations.
On October 22nd we air 1985’s brilliant Hannah and Her Sisters which won favorable comparisons to Chekhov, and earned Allen his second Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.
Come October 29th and we have Bergman and Shakespeare inspired 1982’s A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy, the first of Allen‘s films to star new paramour Mia Farrow.
Detailed synopsis of the Woody Allen movies is enclosed for your perusal.
Woody Allen fare for the Month of October:-
Tuesday 8th October 2002 at 9:00 pm
Annie Hall (1977)
Starring: Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, Shelley Duvall, Tony Roberts, Paul Simon
Directed by: Woody Allen
Produced by: Charles H. Joffe
Written by: Woody Allen, Marshall Brickman
Woody Allen co-wrote, directed, and stars in this award-winning film as a sketchy Brooklyn comedian wistfully recalling his bygone relationship with flighty, adorable, and irrepressibly midwestern (read: not Jewish) Annie Hall. The film marked a transition from Allen’s earlier absurdist comedies to a richer vein of thoughtful consideration of relationships. The gentle narrative revolutionized the urban romantic-comedy genre, while Keaton’s hip, man-tailored wardrobe set the 1977 fashion standard. The film is filled with memorable scenes and oft-quoted lines and features Allen talking right into the camera, a technique that was not commonplace at the time. Allen, playing comedian Alvy Singer, uses many of his stand-up comedy routines in the film as he woos the wonderful Diane Keaton, playing the title character, Annie Hall. As Alvy helps Annie mature, she grows apart from him, choosing to live in Southern California, which is the antithesis of his deep love for New York. The film features fabulous visual and verbal gags, a propensity for food scenes, and memorable cameos by the likes of Marshall McLuhan, Paul Simon, Christopher Walken, Truman Capote, Shelley Duvall, and others.
Tuesday 15th October 2002 at 9:00 pm
Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)
Starring: Martin Landau, Anjelica Huston, Woody Allen, Joanna Gleason, Alan Alda
Directed by: Woody Allen
Produced by: Robert Greenhut
Written by: Woody Allen
CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS is Woody Allen’s most mature, most profound film. Martin Landau plays Judah Rosenthal, a successful ophthalmologist having an affair with Dolores (Anjelica Huston), who is threatening to reveal their relationship unless Judah commits to her and leaves his wife. He admits his sin to Ben (Sam Waterston), a friend, a patient, and a learned rabbi who is losing his eyesight but not his faith. Judah turns to his brother Jack, who is connected to the mob and can make Dolores disappear. Allen plays Cliff Stern, a documentary filmmaker who accepts an assignment to film his pompous, successful brother-in-law, Lester (Alan Alda), a comedy star; both Cliff and Lester fall for Hallie Reed (Mia Farrow), a producer involved in the documentary. Allen the director brings all the characters together in a fabulous mix of comedy and drama, deceit and delight. CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS is a marvel of complexity, with fascinating, well-written characters; deep, complicated relationships; and thought-provoking examinations of religion, infidelity, morality, murder, comedy, and tragedy.
Tuesday 22nd October 2002 at 9:00 pm
Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
Starring: Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, Dianne Wiest, Michael Caine, Barbara Hershey
Directed by: Woody Allen
Produced by: Robert Greenhut
Written by: Woody Allen
Woody Allen combined the best parts of his earlier films in creating HANNAH AND HER SISTERS, his 1986 masterwork about the changing relationships among three sisters living in New York City. Hannah (Mia Farrow) has put her acting career aside in order to take care of her family with second husband Elliot (Michael Caine in an Oscar-winning performance). Elliot has fallen in love with Hannah’s sister Lee (Barbara Hershey), who herself is feeling suffocated by her cynical, mean-spirited loner of a lover, played with great intensity by Ingmar Bergman regular Max von Sydow. Meanwhile, third sister Holly (Oscar winner Dianne Wiest) is struggling to find her own voice, working as a caterer while she tries to get her own acting career going. And in the middle of everything is Mickey (Woody Allen at his most neurotic), a television writer who is divorced from Hannah, has dated Holly, and, when he suspects he might have a brain tumor, decides to reevaluate his life and his faith in God.
Tuesday 29th October2002 at 9:00 pm
A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy (1982)
Starring: Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, Jos Ferrer, Mary Steenburgen, Tony Roberts
Directed by: Woody Allen
Produced by: Robert Greenhut
Written by: Woody Allen
Woody Allen’s delightful farce deals with the misadventures of three couples who spend the weekend together in the country. They all seem to end up in love with the wrong person.