Love and Death (1975)

Early Woody Allen movies are fun to watch, and a much different brand of humor from his later works -- even most of his films after, say, Manhattan.

I watch a film like Love and Death, for example, and although I'm not an expert in Groucho Marx, that's exactly what it puts me in the mind of. In other words, the plot of the film is secondary. It's all about the gags, the one-liners, and the facial expressions. If you watch it for that, then you probably have a good time.

The setting for this one is Napoleonic Europe. Boris (Allen) doesn't want to be a fighter, but he's not built to be much of a lover. He loves his cousin, Sonja (Diane Keaton), but she loves just about everyone but him. Eventually, they do marry, and she might even admit that he turned out to be the love of her life. By that time, however, Boris is frolicking through the trees with Death.

From time-to-time, Boris breaks the fourth wall and speaks right to the camera. That's even how the film ends. Allen is never going to play by any conventional film rules. Every film he tries something different. Of course it's interesting to catch him do certain gags twice. In this film, Boris is on a cross. Fielding in Bananas also finds himself up on a cross at one point.

Since Boris is played by Woody Allen, he seems very Jewish. I guess it's part of the joke, though, because Boris is not supposed to be Jewish. Not that it really matters, because everything in this sort of movie is supposed to be ridiculous and absurd.

Rating: 3.5/5 stars

Comments

"Digging for the Truth" Experiment #4 -- The Federalist Radio Hour

I first heard of Sean Davis last week. He created an online magazine called The Federalist in 2011, and he currently has about 500,000 followers on X. It was about last week that he posted something amazing. He suggested if the Supreme Court doesn't rule the way they should, not only should Trump just ignore the ruling, if they keep obstructing the administration, he should just dissolve the Court altogether. And I thought, wow. This guy is saying outrageous stuff like that, and there's an audience for it. So, I decided I'd listen to an episode of The Federalist podcast: April 17, 2025 -- Deportation, Due Process, and Deference to the American People (40 minutes) https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deportation-due-process-and-deference-to-the/id983782306?i=1000703904873 In the 40-minute conversation, the host and guest discussed why due process wasn't required for illegal immigrants. The case of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia was mentioned for a brief second, but...

In Utero

In 1994, I wore my In Utero shirt to college. I’d walk down the hall, and people would look at the shirt. I still remember a professor looking at it, not apparently hip to the scene. She asked, “Bret, is there something you’re trying to tell us?” I had no idea what I was trying to say. Kurt Cobain had just shot his head off with a shotgun. Before that life-changing event, I hadn’t been the biggest fan of Nirvana, but I did recognize the immediate impact “Smells Like Teen Spirit” had on music, or at least on MTV. Nirvana had seemingly killed and buried Hair Metal, and they had done it single-handedly. What exactly was this “Alternative” sound? It was weird, because soon it felt like everything was “alternative,” and that didn’t make any sense. Once everything is the same, how can it be anything but standard, normal? Nirvana was okay, but at least at the time I was wearing the merch, I was much more into Offspring and Green Day and Tool. And that’s about as far as I went into...

I Must Betray You -- Ruta Sepetys

I appreciate the pacing. The author's epilogue includes her mission statement -- historical fiction as a way to keep history alive. Romanis is an obscure place, but she hopes people reading the book will take an interest in its history. She also makes the point that there are no clean endings. So, the evil dictator and his wife were killed, but the problems they created didn't magically go away, the country still had to find its way and move forward, and it was a process.

The Writer's Poke

Search This Blog