Woody Allen writes, directs, and usually stars in at least one movie every year and has for nearly forty years now. He is easily among my top three favorite filmmakers, but even if I've yet to see a film of his that is anywhere near bad, you can't make that many movies and pack a punch every time. Broadway Danny Rose is a wonderful little dramedy that despite its heartfelt morale is very light on its feet almost like an old Leo McCarey comedy. It is set in a black-and-white 1970s, even though there is a marquee listing Halloween III: Season of the Witch, but don't most movies have fleeting, minor factual errors?
One of my favorite things about Woody Allen's movies is the warm realism of the company one keeps while watching them. In Broadway Danny Rose, he pinpoints a specific and rarely as acutely portrayed sort of people. The story of Woody Allen's character is told through the simple dialogue of a group of old comedians populating a table at a deli reminiscing about old times. These guys, to me, are the essential point of reference when using the words "chum," "pal," and "buddy o' mine." They're middle-aged men that will not be bred into a similar sort of mold ever again, because they're dialect, mannerisms and earthy, customary approach to everything are a product of growing up in the early to mid-20th century. When it was said that women are the ones made of water and earth, elements of emotion and practicality, and men were made of fire and air, metaphors for energetic expression, mentality, and sociability, these were the ones they were talking about. Having grown up with parents and an uncle from that generation, knowing their friends, I was reminded of the coziness and complete absence of pressure in sitting around talking with that kind of easy, mild, expected value sort of man, and Woody Allen writes and directs them with an endearing and intelligent notability.
The love of the company doesn't just taper away after the kitchen-sink-style deli comedian narrators, sort of a device I would imagine in a Cassavetes film if Cassavetes ever used narration. Woody Allen's character, Danny Rose, the man with the thankless job of doing everything he can to harbor his acts and make them successful, no matter how ridiculous and hopeless they are. He goes out of his way, just out of heart, to keep them happy and focused on their careers, only to be used a stepping stone and a laughing stock. But he keeps pushing new acts and never thinking of building up a shell or an edge with them. He keeps himself available in every way. The movie's farce comes from his beautiful self- sacrificial motive to keep his especially self-centered Italian crooner, played effectively by Nick Apollo-Forte, focused and satisfied for his shortly upcoming performance, even though the gigantically risky thing Danny must do only comes out of the latently aware must-have- everything-my-way mentality of Apollo-Forte.
The film is not a suffocatingly side-splitting masterpiece like many of Woody's other comedies, but it does have its great moments and one-liners. Allen at one point refers to his aunt as "looking like something you would find in a live bait store." One of his best yet, don't you think? There's a great non sequitur in the middle of being chased by a Mafia hit man where because of an odd, objectless circumstance, a sequence of dialogue that would normally be a serious, obligatory piece of the plot is spoken by Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, and said hit man all in high pitch as an effect of the inhalation of leaking helium. What a great way to spice up what would've been a rather dull, only necessary scene.
One of my favorite things about Woody Allen's movies is the warm realism of the company one keeps while watching them. In Broadway Danny Rose, he pinpoints a specific and rarely as acutely portrayed sort of people. The story of Woody Allen's character is told through the simple dialogue of a group of old comedians populating a table at a deli reminiscing about old times. These guys, to me, are the essential point of reference when using the words "chum," "pal," and "buddy o' mine." They're middle-aged men that will not be bred into a similar sort of mold ever again, because they're dialect, mannerisms and earthy, customary approach to everything are a product of growing up in the early to mid-20th century. When it was said that women are the ones made of water and earth, elements of emotion and practicality, and men were made of fire and air, metaphors for energetic expression, mentality, and sociability, these were the ones they were talking about. Having grown up with parents and an uncle from that generation, knowing their friends, I was reminded of the coziness and complete absence of pressure in sitting around talking with that kind of easy, mild, expected value sort of man, and Woody Allen writes and directs them with an endearing and intelligent notability.
The love of the company doesn't just taper away after the kitchen-sink-style deli comedian narrators, sort of a device I would imagine in a Cassavetes film if Cassavetes ever used narration. Woody Allen's character, Danny Rose, the man with the thankless job of doing everything he can to harbor his acts and make them successful, no matter how ridiculous and hopeless they are. He goes out of his way, just out of heart, to keep them happy and focused on their careers, only to be used a stepping stone and a laughing stock. But he keeps pushing new acts and never thinking of building up a shell or an edge with them. He keeps himself available in every way. The movie's farce comes from his beautiful self- sacrificial motive to keep his especially self-centered Italian crooner, played effectively by Nick Apollo-Forte, focused and satisfied for his shortly upcoming performance, even though the gigantically risky thing Danny must do only comes out of the latently aware must-have- everything-my-way mentality of Apollo-Forte.
The film is not a suffocatingly side-splitting masterpiece like many of Woody's other comedies, but it does have its great moments and one-liners. Allen at one point refers to his aunt as "looking like something you would find in a live bait store." One of his best yet, don't you think? There's a great non sequitur in the middle of being chased by a Mafia hit man where because of an odd, objectless circumstance, a sequence of dialogue that would normally be a serious, obligatory piece of the plot is spoken by Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, and said hit man all in high pitch as an effect of the inhalation of leaking helium. What a great way to spice up what would've been a rather dull, only necessary scene.