Word: toed
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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So, what we get is the Allen persona of all his films, at least up to Annie Hall--ingratiatingly awkward and insecure, morbid, conscientious; intellectual and only saved from pseudo-intellectualism because his sidekicks are transparently far more pompous and shallow. Above all, he's acutely aware of all these...
The distance between the director and the screen persona is exactly the same as the distance it flatteringly allows the viewer to place between his real and everyday persons. It licenses us to believe that our everyday behavior doesn't truly reflect our character, which is altogether deeper, more astute...
He gets away with it because his only distinctive talent is that he tells jokes extremely well. (Though he's a dreadful actor, embarassing when he's not laughing at something or other.) This is where he's been so lucky with Diane Keaton, who's a decent enough actress...
At once massively narcissistic and entirely cowardly, Allen is everywhere, but almost never filmed alone in close-up. He's never shown in solitude (though often oh so wrenchingly alone.) It's his privilege to make fun of himself (so that by a sleight-of-hand he accepts the contempt...
So Diane Keaton has to get stoned before sex in Annie Hall; this is just a joke (like her family). With Woody Allen, the same situation would be defused (but taken seriously) by a reference to his maternal ogre, a castrating Semite battleaxe. And he's notably coy about showing...