In defense of Woody Allen (a response)

“Woody Allen never had a worldview to begin with,” writes Dan Rottenberg in his response to my review of Allen’s Blue Jasmine.

Woody Allen has no worldview? Are you kidding?

Like Anton Chekhov, like Samuel Beckett, like Charlie Chaplin, Woody Allen’s weltanschauung can be summed up unequivocally, loudly and clearly, in one word: tragicomedy.

Moreover, Woody Allen is a consistent filmmaker. His writing distinguishes itself with clearly defined, recurring themes that run throughout his work, that he keeps on investigating, developing, rearticulating, refining.

“I’ve been writing the same play all my life,” says Edward Albee, unapologetically, paraphrasing his friend Louise Nevelson, who said the same about her own work (in her case, sculpture).

So does Woody Allen. He writes the same film over and over (and I mean this as an homage to his consistency) about “women on the verge of a nervous breakdown” (to quote Almodovar)— from the tortured Penelope Cruz in Vicky Cristina Barcelona to the vulnerable Mia Farrow in Another Woman to the belittled Mia Farrow (again) in Alice, to the impressionable Mariel Hemingway in Manhattan, to the humiliated Caroline Aaron in Crimes and Misdemeanors, to the unhinged Judy Davis and Kirstie Allen in Deconstructing Harry, to the suicidal Judy Davis (again) in Celebrity to the self-absorbed Ellen Page in To Rome With Love”“ and yes, even, the bellicose “Jewish mother figure in the sky” in the outrageous Oedipus Wrecks.

Who ends up alone?

Consider the above-mentioned unraveling women: Almost all of them end up on their feet. Judy Davis gets her act together and gets the guy— in this case, the irresistible, too-good-to-be-true Joe Mantegna, and the Woody Allen stand-in character (Kenneth Branagh) ends up all alone. Kirstie Allen takes her and Woody’s son away from him, and Woody Allen (playing himself) ends up all alone. Mariel Hemingway grows up and goes to college, and Woody Allen (playing himself) ends up all alone. Diane Keaton (in Annie Hall) moves on, and Woody Allen (playing himself) ends up all alone. Ellen Page in To Rome With Love gets a part in a movie and goes to Hollywood, and the Woody Allen stand-in character (Jesse Eisenberg) ends up all alone. And so on.

So he’s written the same theme over and over with consistency, compassion, insight and almost always with humor. And in the end, the joke is almost always on him.

That is, until Blue Jasmine, the first film wherein (in my view) Allen shows a cold-blooded lack of pity and empathy for his female protagonist. As a devoted admirer of Woody Allen, I find his treatment of Jasmine French chilling— no matter how flawed her character may be. Indeed, after I wrote my review for BSR, I went back to see the film again, to see if my reaction had been off base. I left the film reeling, as before.

Cruel treatment

Dan Rottenberg and others will argue that Woody Allen is obsessed with women, or he’s terminally ambivalent about women, and so on. Maybe so. But leaving Cate Blanchett on a park bench, abandoned, homeless, penniless, humiliated, outcast, talking to herself? That’s downright cruel, as well as inconclusive.

The only other time Woody Allen has come close to that kind of treatment of his female protagonist is in the denouement of Hannah and Her Sisters, wherein Diane Wiest ends up with Woody Allen and her sister Mia Farrow (formerly married to Woody Allen, in life, as well as in the film) is left (unloved) with Michael Caine, who (she knows) clearly adores but has been rejected by the third sister, Barbara Hershey.

(All right— maybe that’s a bad example. You might argue that ending up with Woody Allen isn’t such a good deal, and that it’s better to end up with Michael Caine, no matter what his true feelings may be.)

“I have always depended on the kindness of strangers,” Blanche DuBois declares in the final scene of A Streetcar Named Desire, when she is led off to the mental hospital by a doctor and an attendant. Meanwhile, what did the stranger do in Blue Jasmine— the one who shared Cate Blanchett’s park bench in that final, devastating scene? She left the bench and moved away.

Life is unfair, but”¦

Let’s move on to Woody Allen’s clearly articulated, consistent worldview, as expressed in the following films (among many):

Crimes and Misdemeanors: It can be found in the closing words of the philosopher Louis Levy, who said (and I paraphrase) that life is incomprehensible, that it is painful, that it is unfair, but that somehow we get through it— thanks to the quotidian comfort we get from friends, from family, from our children and from the knowledge that we can find the strength to endure.

(Sound familiar? Check out Sonya’s final speech in Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya.)

Deconstructing Harry: It can be found in the closing words of the professor (played by Philip Bosco) at Woody Allen’s honoring ceremony at Adair University (taking place in Allen’s imagination), who says that the moral of the story is (and again I paraphrase): Get over yourself, and get on with your life.

Writer’s block

As for Dan’s accusation that Woody Allen exists within the confines of his own, insular, self-absorbed world— remember, to his credit, that Woody Allen was the first to admit it! In Deconstructing Harry (again), Allen says, in the closing moments when he sits down at his typewriter, having finally overcome his writer’s block (his character’s name, by the way, is Harry Block): “I like it”¦. I like it”¦. A character who can’t function in life, but can only function in art— in his writing, that saved his life”¦.”

As for Dan’s other accusation that Woody Allen at 77 just wants to make films (and work with celebrities), so what? Aren’t we lucky to see all the marvelous actors that he continues to attract?

In any case, I truly believe that— given what we know about his personal life as well as his work— Woody Allen, like his character Harry Block, writes because that’s what keeps him sane and that’s what saves his life.

In the past, Woody Allen has let a number of his characters get away with murder ”“ like Jonathan Rhys Meyers in Matchpoint, or Martin Landau in Crimes and Misdemeanors, or Tom Wilkinson in Cassandra’s Dream. So why now, at this late point in his career, does he punish Jasmine, Cate Blanchett’s character, for her transgressions?

Perhaps Blue Jasmine marks an unanticipated departure for Woody Allen into even deeper, darker waters at this late date. Perhaps he feels that “the eye of God,” which haunted Martin Landau’s character in Crimes and Misdemeanors, is now looking down upon him.