MANHATTAN (1979)

Forty-two year old comedy writer Isaac (Allen) is in a relationship with a beautiful 17-year-old high school student, that is until until he starts hooking up with his best friend's mistress. That's pretty much the entire film, but it's all somebody with the storytelling genius of Woody Allen needs to create a wonderful and involving film. When we first meet Isaac he's hanging out with his young lover and his best friend and his best friend's wife. The friend tells Isaac that he's secretly having an affair. As luck would have it, not too long afterwards Isaac runs into the friend and his mistress while at an art gallery. Isaac takes an instant disliking to her (she insulted Ingmar Bergman!!!!!), but underneath his hatred is the coiled sexual power of a jungle cat and it's only a matter of time before they're screwing so great. Screws so great? Screws so great.

MANHATTAN is an excellent film, but I guess it wasn't excellent enough for The Academy Awards that year because they didn't even nominate it for Best Picture! Then again the real Best Picture of 1979 (ALIEN) didn't get nominated either, so what the fuck do I know? I'm just some asshole who spends too much time and stays up way too late writing bullshit that nobody reads...but let's be more optimistic. Well, all right, why is life worth living? That's a very good question. Um, well, there are certain things, I...I guess, that make it worthwhile. Uh, like what? Okay...um for me...uh. Oh, I would say, what, Robert McCammon to name one thing. And um and John Steinbeck and...um... the...The Beatles...and um, death metal...Swedish movies naturally..."The Earth" by Emile Zola, umm...Jack Lemmon, Flannery O'Connor...umm those incredible Apples and Pears by Cezanne...uh..the crabs at Sam Wo's...Rambo and Susie's furry little faces.

[Update 2018: add Charlie's furry little face to the list.]

INTERIORS (1978)

Three adult sisters are having trouble coping with the sudden separation of their parents. The split shouldn't have come as a surprise since the mother has ruled the family with an iron fist for a number of years, but it did comes as a surprise. To make matters worse the mother has a history of mental illness and now, in her denial, she's become suicidal. Added to this crisis is the personal life drama (husband/boyfriend, job, family history etc.) of each of the sisters.

With his previous film (ANNIE HALL) Allen proved that he was capable of more than just broad comedies by introducing a level of seriousness never seen before in his films, but with INTERIORS he takes it to the next level: the pacing is purposely slow; there's no music for nearly the entire film; the colors are all subdued and bleak; zero laughs; hardly any action beyond talking. INTERIORS is most decidedly not what audiences were expecting from the guy who brought them TAKE THE MONEY AND RUN and SLEEPER, but if they had an open mind about it they ended up being treated to one of the best films of the 1970's.

A number of critics simply dismiss INTERIORS as an "homage to Ingmar Bergman" (what's wrong with that?!), even so it's still a powerful and emotionally moving film that should not only be seen but studied...especially the script and the set decoration. I cannot recommend it enough.  It's a masterpiece.  I'm very surprised that Geraldine Page didn't win the Oscar for Best Actress.