Skip to main content

Café Society: A Review




With Woody Allen films, at least in recent times, the viewer either gets a movie that’s instantly forgettable (Magic in the Moonlight, Irrational Man) or instant classics (Midnight in Paris, Blue Jasmine). Café Society breaks the trend by falling between these two categories by being neither a classic nor unmemorable. Drenched in nostalgia like many of Allen’s best films the movie never really seems to come off as a film instead of incredibly well-crafted idea and so at times it’s possible to lose interest.

The movie is theoretically about emotion and passionate love but surprisingly (considering the director) never really manages to find the right chord that makes it seem like this passion is felt. Jesse Eisenberg is the latest actor who seems to be playing the onscreen role of a young Woody Allen and easily nails the role. His scene with the prostitute may be the best Woody Allen scene not actually starring the man himself.

The film is separated into two main arcs -Eisenberg’s Bobby moving to Los Angeles and his attempts to make it out there while falling for his uncle’s secretary Vonnie( played by Kirsten Stewart in an excellent performance) and his return to New York to run a nightclub with his mobster brother. The first half of the film is the better with the structure of Bobby and Vonnie’s relationship and the barriers to it more believable. The second half seems somewhat rushed and while some of the vignettes are entertaining (especially those featuring his brother, Ben) they don’t seem to merge seamlessly enough to stop the story from jarring.



In terms of the technical aspects, this is Allen’s first film with acclaimed cinematographer Vittorio Storaro (The Last Emperor, Apocalypse Now) and also his first film in digital. The result is a beautifully shot film which definitely brings the viewer into the Golden Age of 1930s Hollywood. The scenes in the nightclub especially are representative of the excellent visuals of the film.


Café Society is not one of Allen’s best films but it is his best film since Blue Jasmine three years ago. In sentiment and style it is closer to 2011’s Midnight in Paris (though my bias will always lean towards a Parisian setting even on scripts of equal measure, which this script is not) but with repeated emphasis on older Allen works set in New York. The total movie feels as though Allen was happy self-referencing rather than challenging himself and while that isn’t a bad thing when the body of work that’s being referenced is of such quality, the film never really speaks to the heart. And that’s a problem when you’re watching a love story. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Oscar Predictions-Film Awards (i)

Best Director Most likely winner :     Steven Spielberg   for Lincoln. Leaving out Ben Affleck, Kathryn Bigelow and Quentin Tarantino pretty much made this Spielberg's to lose. And doesn't reflect too well on the Academy either. Backup Pick :    David O. Russell for  Silver Linings Playbook. The production company of Weinstein have been campaigning hard for this and it's a good film with the acting performances set up well. The thing about best director is it's the easiest award to give to someone the academy likes because it's ambiguous and the academy doesn't really love Russell. Most deserving :      Michel Haneke for  Amour. Haneke has the most carefully crafted film here. All in all it is definitely his film in every scene. His presence is all around the film and it is an excellent film. If they give it for the greatest impact a director has on the film, this is it. Best Adapted Screenplay Most li...

(Short) Analysis of the (length of stay for) teams at World Cup 2014 - Groups A and B

I like World Cup, quite a lot, and think it's the best of all the tournaments that exist in football and very possibly in all of sport (at least for any tournament focused on one sport since the Olympics is amazing because of the variety). So I'll be trying to figure out how likely each team is to get out of the group stages and how far they'll probably go if they do. All the odds are from  www.bet365.com  which is the site I use most for trend spotting in sport (it's like my sport-Bloomberg). Group A Brazil- Automatically qualified as hosts and at 1/20 to qualify have the second best odds of any team to make it out of the group phase behind Argentina (who have probably the softest group). It's with good reason Brazil have such low odds and they're considered favourites. Winning or even coming second in Group A doesn't mean an easy run as it probably would result in a round of sixteen clash against either defending champions Spain or the ...

Best Films of the Decade - 2010s - Third Part

11. Get Out (2017)-  Directed and written by  Jordan Peele. Horror seems to be an excellent medium to describe racism and it's somewhat amazing how obvious it seems in hindsight. One of the best debuts of a director in recent times, with a script that amps up the tension marvelously and serves up a twist in the tale that was impossible to see coming. Normally horror movies are seen as niche, but this film was popular with the wide audience and also at the award ceremonies further proving everyone was able to be captured by the film's quality. There has been talk of the film fitting into horror-comedy, probably due to Peele's comedy background, but while it is never laughably funny but does serve as a clever satire on the state of racial affairs. 12. The Death of Stalin (2017) - Directed by  Armando Iannuci.  Written by  Armando Iannuci, David Schneider and Ian Martin. Few topics are as ripe for satire as the workings of communist governments (provi...