Storytelling technique always stands out to me for some reason, and in Woody Allen films, especially, since he tends to change approaches from film to film.
In this one, the narrator is Joe (Woody Allen -- Seth Green as the child in the film). This is okay, except he ends up telling us things that he, as a child, wouldn't have any first-hand (and sometimes, probably not even second-hand) knowledge of. I know if you just accept the conceit of the storytelling device, it's not a big deal, but little stuff like that is hard for me to ignore. The fix? Make the narrator omniscient.
Other than the characters, the real star of the film is the music. Now, this is 1940s music, so big band stuff, mainly. It plays throughout the movie. It's the soundtrack of Joe's childhood. I know if the movie was set in the 1970s or 1980s, or even the 1990s, I would appreciate the music a lot more. As is, I hear it, but it doesn't register the same way for me as it does to Joe or someone who grew up in that era. I get the idea of the nostalgia or music and place that the movie taps into, but it's still a little more difficult for me to appreciate it fully.
What I can appreciate is the idea that everyone lived for the radio. It's not much different than how everyone later would live for the television, the Internet, the cellphone. Each generation had "something," and before the radio, maybe it was newspapers or books, and so on. Those who had the money and motivation, lived; those who didn't, listened to the radio and lived vicariously.
In terms of the adult characters and their issues, I'm probably like Joe -- I know that the adults and their issues exist, but I don't care too much. I'm more interested in the fact that my substitute teacher was the same woman me and my friends happened to see dancing naked in front of a mirror in her apartment.
For the most part, this is a movie I feel like I could leave on and play in the background, kind of like a radio. I didn't feel myself locked in to watching every second of every scene.
Jeff Daniels and Wallace Stevens have small roles (and it's funny that Stevens is the radio's "Masked Avenger.") Towards the end of the film, each of their characters is celebrating New Years 1944 and is feeling someone melancholy: 1) Will our generation be remembered? and 2) Will we ever learn what the purpose of life is? These seem to be two of the "Bigger Questions" that consume Allen -- and people more generally.
It's probably a coincidence, but both The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985) and this film end with a top hat reference. In Cairo, we focus on Cecilia (Mia Farrow) as she watching Astaire singing "Check to Check" to Rogers in Top Hat (1935). For Radio Days, Sally (Mia Farrow) invited everyone to the rooftop to take a look at the New York skyline. What's actually most visible up on the rooftop are fancy New York billboards. After Sally and everyone all go back down to the ballroom to continue celebrating 1944, the camera stays on the roof and focuses on a Top Hat rising slowly on its billboard.
Rating: 2.5/5 stars
Comments
Post a Comment