…and it’s soundtrack!
Some would say that it’s a great movie BECAUSE Woody isn’t in it! This is my favorite Woody Allen movie. One problem with many of his movies is that he plays the same stereotypical neurotic Jew in all of them, starting with What’s New, Pussycat? (actor/writer, not director).
I would also like to throw in a plug for Everything You Wanted To Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask). Not a serious Woody Allen movie - more like Kentucky Fried Movie or The Groove Tube - a series of skits (and the titles of the skits are the only thing tying the movie to the book). Haven’t seen it it decades, so I’m pretty sure that there’s plenty of comedy bits that don’t hold up well today. The two bits I really remember are Gene Wilder playing a psychiatrist who gets a patient who’s in love with a sheep; and “brain-control-room” scene where a guy (was it Woody?) has sex in a car.
It has been a long time but I believe Woody was a sperm in that chapter.
What I remember most about EYAWTKASBWATA was the “Time to make the donuts” guy as a transvestite.
Sorry 'bout quoting an old post, but …
I’m active with a BSA Venture Crew (think Boy Scouts, but for older kids). They were talking about having a lock-in and watching movies, eating pizza, etc. One of the adults suggested My Cousin Vinny; I agreed that it’s a great, funny movie. Then, we checked and it has something absurd like 120 F-bombs; definitely wouldn’t be appropriate for an official Boy Scouts of America event.
I think (at least I remember it as) he was also the voice of the guy having sex. Yes, he was definitely one of the sperms. “What if it’s just a hand job?” “I’ve heard stories of guys jumping out and running head first into a hard rubber barrier!” or something like that. Like I’ve said - it’s been a few decades.
That wouldn’t have been my call, but you know your audience best. It’s too bad because I’m sure the kids would have enjoyed it. In the US it is indeed rated R for language which I think is totally silly, but in Canada most provinces gave it a very mild 14A rating (14 years or older unless accompanied by an adult) while Quebec rated it G. From what I can see BSA Venture Crew is for ages 14 to 20. If anyone had asked me if My Cousin Vinny contained foul language, I would have said no – I guess I never even noticed.
One of the astonishing things about this movie is how many well-known actors were willing to take small roles in this film in which they looked ridiculous. Another strange thing is that this was based on a nonfiction book by this name. The author David Reuben was willing to turn his advice into something ridiculous.
Big-name actors willing to work for peanuts to be in a Woody Allen film is an old story with a long history.
I’m kinda surprised at all the love for Midnight in Paris. I really looked forward to seeing it when it first came out. Time travel is my jam. But I found it shallow, lame, and predictable. I was really disappointed.
As others have said, most of his movies without him are better. I liked Bullets Over Broadway, Annie Hall, and Hannah and her Sisters. That dreadful cocaine scene in Annie Hall is an example of his awful acting skills.
That reminds me of the time our church had a teen sleepover movie night. My wife was one of the attending parents, and as she listed the movies to me before heading there, one was Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I was like, “enjoy the Castle Anthrax scenes!” 
She said later that it was pretty awkward for a minute, but it passed pretty quickly.
Eh, to me Woody Allen’s terrible acting is part of the schtick that makes him funny. The same has been said of Jerry Seinfeld, although to a much lesser extent – Seinfeld’s barely suppressed smirks at the funny lines are a distraction. But a lot of Allen’s acting comes across as him having no intention of having the exaggerated tones and gestures taken seriously. Just MHO.
Nah, it’s the lame physical comedy like sneezing on the cocaine and blowing at all over the room or pulling the tape out of a casette into a tangled ball of snarled plastic. He acts the one character he plays over and over and over fine. It’s the schtick he writes for himself that’s cringingly bad to me.
Not in 1972 it wasn’t.
And that one character is what got me to be a fan of Allen’s films. Short, nervous, glasses-wearing, a constant film fan because he expects he’ll never get a date, convinced that no woman is ever going to be interested in him despite his hopeless attempts, able to imagine himself as a heroic figure although he’s not one. The thing is though that Allen as a real person is not really like that at all. He never really had that much trouble attracting women. He’s a fan of basketball. I like his characters because I project myself into them, even though they’re really just made-up and not like him.
Woody Allen invented and played that character so well that people just assumed that’s who he was. In an earlier time, Jack Benny created the character of a vain, miserly man, and played it for years, but in reality, he was known as kind and generous.
It’s called “acting.”
And that’s why I like his movies. He created a character that I like. If you know of any other filmmakers who’ve created an similar interesting character, please recommend them to me.
The sneezing was real. Of course, in filming the scene he didn’t use cocaine but just some random white legal powder. It caused him to sneeze as they filmed the scene. He tested that on an audience and they loved it:
Crimes and Misdemeanors is his finest achievement IMO.
In the late 1960s, brother was in the army and somehow was in California. He needed a ride, waiting for a cab, when a car pulled up and asked him where he needed to go. He got in the bag back seat and there he met Jack Benny, who told him he is always glad to give a ride to a soldier in uniform.