Annie Hall

Studying in a creative field, such as film, I find it very important not to forget what kind of work that inspired me and made me choose this field. To keep my interest up I need to go back to these works once in a while. For me, many of Woody Allen’s movies have definitely inspired me to want to make my own movies. This weekend I watched Annie Hall (made in 1977), one of his best, and of course most famous films. Maybe what is most notably about it is his way of storytelling; scenes jump in different directions, we move between his mind and the film’s reality, all of a sudden Alvy (Allen’s character) turns to the camera and asks or complains to the audience. Alvy even manages to make situations maybe all of us has wished to participate in, such as the time he argues with a man in the line to the cinema about Marshall McLuhan; the man obnoxiously claims he knows a lot about McLuhan’s theories because he teaches a course in media, Alvy questions him and then brings out the real McLuhan from behind one of the posters, McLuhan then tells the man he has no idea about his theories (here is a clip of it). It is scenes like these that make this movie such a masterpiece. It shows the extreme control Woody Allen has over the medium. No wonder it won four Oscars, and has been such an important film for comedies, or romantic films, even made today.

If anyone would like, please post a comment about some work that has inspired you to choose your program or field of interest. That would be very interesting.