Maybe Mia Farrow works better in small doses for me. I just have a hard time seeing her as a lead in any movie, and she's definitely in this movie almost from beginning to end. That's somewhat annoying.
She's not a horrible actor, nor does she have a big hairy mole on her chin. And the reason I don't rate this movie higher has more to do with the writing, probably, than her as the lead.
If Woody Allen wants to turn Alice (Farrow) invisible or to have her love potion accidentally get into the party drink, so that all of the men there fall madly in love with her, I'm okay with that. But this isn't "magical realism" to me. It's just hokey.
Alice is that unfulfilled women who wants something more out of life but can't quite put her finger on what she can to get it. She's rich and has kids. Her husband isn't mean to her, but he never takes her too seriously, and he has his own life -- and affairs. He's supportive to a point, and then he just sort of tunes her out.
She turns to the herbs of a Chinese "doctor." These herbs are treated like potions in the film, and they actually work. In the end, however, she uses them to learn something about herself, and the ending may be better than the rest of the movie, simply because she jumps off the highest building when she realizes that this is the only way she can learn for certain if she can fly.
And fly she does, and by the end, the movie resolves her inner conflict. The man who she toyed having an affair wife has decided he wants one more chance with his ex, and that's the final dose of reality she needs to understand that she can't either go back to her own husband, or finally make a clean break.
She had more to give in life, and she decides to start giving it. She gives up being a kept, unfulfilled woman, and starts living the life that she always wanted to live but could never figure out how.
Rating: 2.5/5 stars
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