Meryl Streep is here in a small role as Isaac’s pissy lesbian ex-wife, intent on embarrassing him. She shot her scenes while on break from Kramer vs. Kramer. I wonder if she regrets it.
The creep factor for this film is off the scale. The obvious starting place is Allen’s 42 going on 62 Isaac dating 17 year old Hemingway as a plausible plot point. But it gets worse when you realize that the man himself was actually dating two different teenage girls during that time. His first wife was sixteen when they wed and his current wife was born nine years after Mariel. It became fashionable to dump on Allen after his Soon-Yi fiasco, but all the warning signs were there.
The success of the film hinges on caring about the Woody Allen character and sympathizing with his concerns and problems. He’s an intellectual snob who hates intellectual snobs, is the catalyst for all of the problems in his life, and whines about everything. But how does one relate to an ugly man who screws up relationships with hot women who for some reason sleep with him? Some of them minors by certain standards. I’ve seen six or eight of his films, which is a small percent of his total, but I am tired of his schtick. His brand of humor (“I think people should mate for life, like pigeons or Catholics”) just doesn’t do it for me anymore. His pedophilia-adjacent behavior notwithstanding.
Manhattan’s saving grace is it’s cinematography. Filmed in black and white anamorphic widescreen, it gives the city a vivid, lush, and classic look. And the city is framed beautifully in every scene. It is truly stunning. Sometimes called a love letter to New York, I think it would have worked better if it was just that, and left the story out of it. AMRU 2.5.
