Note that Polanski’s recent movies haven’t been making money. That’s what the companies who fund their movies care about. (They also want to increase tourism into the city in this proposed new film of Allen’s.) Incidentally, I just looked the following fact up. Polanski is 2 years and 4 months older than Allen.
You can’t really compare Allen with Polanski. Polanski was charged with a crime, and fled the US to escape justice. Allen was never charged with anything, and the accusations against him trashed his reputation in the US despite coming from a questionable and highly unreliable source.
Woody Allen is certainly not a saint and his penchant for young women is well known, but the one correct fact that has stained his reputation was his relationship with Soon-Yi Previn, the adoptive daughter of his then-partner Mia Farrow. But he and Soon-Yi have now been happily married for 28 years, which is more than you can say for many of Allen’s sanctimonious critics.
I saw Woody Allen being interviewed recently and I have to say that at 89 he is certainly not the sharp wit he used to be. It really might be time to retire. But he’s had an amazing career and made many highly critically acclaimed films.
Not just charged; admitted and allocuted to intentionally and with premeditation the drugging and anally sodomizing a 13 year old girl. He got a sweetheart plea deal with five of six charged dismissed and being released with time served (42 days of a planned 90 day psychiatric observation), and special dispensation from the judge to travel to Europe prior to sentencing where he was photographs cavorting with apparently underaged women, upon which the judge decided to revoke preliminary approval of the plea agreement. Unlike Allen, who has never been accused of a crime and of whom abuse allegations from a prejudicial source were investigated and dismissed (and of whom there is no other pattern of abuse claims), Polanski unquestionably committed the crimes of which he was accused (and settled a civil suit) over as well as having been accused by multiple other women of manipulation and abuse. Allen’s relationship is Soon-Yi is kind of skeevy by modern mores (and rightly so) but there is no indication of abuse or controlling behavior in the subsequent three decades of their relationship.
Stranger
No you have my opinion backwards. I think Polanski should be in prison, but the cosmopolitan mindset says he’s just a fine Euro good ol boy who didn’t mean no harm. And stop suppressing our artistes with your delicate American mores!
Allen, leave him alone.
Can I hate Woody Allen because he sucks? He hasn’t made a good movie since Sweet and Lowdown, and he hasn’t made a funny one since Radio Days. He used to be one of my favorite filmmakers, but for the past 25 years all he’s produced is navel-gazing pablum about self-absorbed rich sociopaths.
So you’re saying you prefer his early funny films?
See, that’s another thing I miss about Allen - his self-awareness.
Radio Days is the only movie of his I’ve watched more than once. I do recall enjoying Bullets Over Broadway and The Purple Rose of Cairo though.
Could you tell us what you dislike in these films?:
I’m not saying that I think that they are as good as some of the earlier ones. I prefer the earlier ones actually. Still, the newer films made money, won awards, and had some great actors in them. Could you show us in what way these movies are navel-gazing pablum about self-absorbed rich sociopaths? Specific characters and specific plot points, please.
What a weird question. It assumes that I judge a movie by giving it a perfect grade of 100, and then take off points for all its flaws and demerits until I get a final “score”. I don’t consume entertainment that way. What I do instead, in very broad terms, is start from 0 and add points for things I liked. And the movies I’ve seen from that list just didn’t add up.
I will say, though, that Midnight in Paris was half a good movie. The time travel stuff was fun and interesting; the modern-day scenes, OTOH, were almost unwatchable.
I really liked Midnight in Paris.
I really wanted to. Adrian Brody was born to play Salvador Dali.
I enjoyed it but couldn’t help agreeing with the reviewer who called it “Night at the Museum for liberal arts majors.”
Wow, that’s amazing. I’ve heard of exactly two of those. I assume this is a list of his films made in the last 20 years?
I need to go watch Manhattan and feel old.
25 years.
Fully agree. Midnight in Paris was a big disappointment to me. I expected so much more and so much better. Also, yeah, the modern scenes were made for fastforwarding through. Horrible characters created to be as cliched horrible as possible, So boring.
(Bolding mine) Strongly agree, I’ve ignored him for at least that long. I was a fan of his films since “What’s Up, Tiger Lily?” (1966), still enjoy re-reading his first two books, but for me his greatest movie was “Hannah And Her Sisters” and is the last one I’ve ever wanted to watch more than once.