'Zero Gravity' by Woody Allen

“Comedy just pokes at problems, rarely confronts them squarely. Drama is like a plate of meat and potatoes, comedy is rather the dessert, a bit like meringue.” - Woody Allen

“You know, there’s great wisdom in jokes, Falk, really." - David Dobel (played by Woody Allen) in Anything Else.

The UK feels like the last place in the world to not yet grant a release to Rifkin's Festival, Woody Allen's 49th film. The film had its premiere in September 2020 at the San Sebastian Film Festival and has gradually opened in territories across the globe ever since, including his native USA earlier this year. For UK based fans like myself it means another agonising wait. As with his prior film (A Rainy Day in New York) I'm still debating whether or not to get a foreign DVD/Blu-Ray of Rifkin's Festival as there is still no news of a UK release. I was always grateful for Woody's prolific work rate but only in the last few years have I realised just how blessed we were to have a new film to look forward to each year.

All the outright lies, disproved allegations and hateful media coverage thrown his way haven't diminished Allen's resolve to continue working. At the age of 86 though it may well be that he prefers to stick to written works rather than on-location film shoots. Allen announced on Leonard Maltin's podcast that he had a new collection of short stories set to be published. He also has a new play that will hopefully go in to production in the near future and a new film (his 50th) that is due to start shooting in Paris later this year. 

During the first lockdown in 2020, the publication of Woody Allen's autobiography 'Apropos of Nothing' was a godsend. A book that I'd dreamed about for years was finally in print. We also got the belated release of A Rainy Day in New York. It was hard to judge the film objectively after a two year wait, having been shelved by original distributor Amazon, who in effect chose to bow down to the aforementioned malicious gossip and smears that ignored basic facts and two thorough investigations that exonerated Allen 30 years ago. I was really glad to finally get to see the film but it had a lot of baggage to contend with, notably Rebecca Hall and disingenuous creep T*mothee Ch*lamet’s presence in the cast and their keenness to distance themselves from its writer/director and a project they had actively pursued a role in* as well as a hostile media which seemed determined to lambast the film. In spite of all that, it managed to be a surprising commercial success when audiences got a chance to see it. I need to give it a rewatch to see it with a more nuanced and less bitter view but I remember I liked the freeflowing episodic structure, almost like that of a Robert Altman film, the allusions to J.D. Salinger and Fellini's The White Sheik and there was a standout performance by Cherry Jones, one of several relatively brief but remarkable supporting turns that has often been showcased in Allen’s work.**

'Zero Gravity' is Woody Allen’s fifth collection of short stories, following on from 'Mere Anarchy' in 2007. I was somewhat surprised when a copy of the book that I had pre-ordered in advance from Blackwell's showed up through my letterbox in June (thanks guys) despite having a UK publication date of 4th August. They must have received advanced copies from the US (where it came out in early June). Unlike 'Apropos of Nothing', 'Zero Gravity' seems to have encountered relatively little pushback over its existence in print. It seems that the Cancel Culture mob will allow Allen to publish a collection of short, amusing stories but the idea of him publishing a memoir that corrects many falsehoods and addresses a widely misunderstood 30 year old controversy is completely unacceptable. As I mentioned before, the actions of Amazon and the mainstream media-sponsored hate campaign of M*a and R*nan Farrow have only furthered my determination to follow Woody's work. 'Zero Gravity' fortunately didn't face the same scrutiny or manufactured outrage that 'Apropos of Nothing' had. Perhaps people like the ignorant, lemming-like d*psh*ts at Hachette Publishing who staged a walkout over the original bookdeal only have problems with non-fiction works? Could it be that R*nan Farrow, Hachette Book Group and the mainstream media didn't like the idea of Allen countering many of the myths that have grown about him over time and revealing a less than flattering side of his main accuser M*a Farrow? Despite numerous allegations of abuse over the years and various accounts of (to put it mildly) inappropriate behaviour towards her offspring and adopted children it seems that she is beyond reproach.***

Allen is well versed in this sort of storytelling. Amusing episodes are scattered throughout his work. There was an anecdotal quality to his early stand-up comic routines and Allen has written for the New Yorker many times in the past, including some of the stories (called “casuals” by the publication) featured here. In his filmography this quality was at its best and perhaps most successfully woven in to the episodic tapestry of Radio Days (the film works gloriously as a series of reminiscences about childhood events), the faux-documentary/newsreel style of Zelig and the jigsaw-like structure of Deconstructing Harry. Oedipus Wrecks, his contribution to the 3 part anthology film New York Stories, was a throwaway idea that found a perfect outlet in a 40 minute short film. A lot of his early directorial work (Take the Money and Run, Bananas, Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Sex but Were Afraid to Ask) harkens back to the two reeler comedies of the silent era by the likes of Charles Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd and Laurel and Hardy. Less successfully, Hollywood Ending's story of a washed up filmmaker struck by temporary blindness when he's given a chance at a comeback project felt very much like a short story expanded to feature length while To Rome with Love comes across like some dusted off, cast-aside ideas that were revived for a portmanteau flick when financing came through to make a film in Italy. As someone who enjoys some of Allen’s more light-hearted and ostensibly frothy offerings (Curse of the Jade Scorpion, Alice, Magic in the Moonlight)**** as well as his previous prose collections I was only too eager to read this new collection.

'Zero Gravity' is a joyful read. At a time where it feels like every story and concept has been stretched to breaking point by bestsellers that feel at least 100 pages too long, prolonged series on streaming services and "Cinematic Universes" and "World Building" (God, how I loathe those terms) in mainstream movies, this sort of concision, disciplined writing, craftsmanship and brevity is like a breath of fresh air. When I saw Wonder Wheel on the big screen I was astonished about the ease with which Allen was able to establish the main characters, locations and scenario within the first ten minutes when many of my other cinema trips around that time had me suffering through muddled storytelling, weak, disjointed characterisation and an inability to convey atmosphere or any tangible sense of the environment in which the film took place. Allen’s wordplay, love of absurd names and details, skittish nature, cultural leanings and ability to deftly weave in incidental surprises with effortless aplomb all come through in this collection. The snappy nature of the stories means that even the lesser entries in the collection never overstay their welcome and the next story is more than likely to have its own delights and confounding interludes. 

Favourite stories:

'There is Nothing Like a Brain' in which a beverage stand worker sees his old college crush, who is attracted to intellectual types. She becomes interested in him after he gets hit with a frying pan during a burglary which causes synethesia, a condition that makes his brain produce extraordinary feats. In his case he is able to recall the dining habits of people throughout history.

'Sorry, No Pets Allowed' in which a raunchy and promiscuous female popstar is subjected to a backlash and outrage when she states that she draws the line at animals.  It's a nice swipe at Cancel Culture and PR-driven outrage in contemporary media and entertainment. 

'Tails of Manhattan' chronicles a wealthy dentist who commits suicide after losing all of his savings in a Ponzi scheme and is reincarnated as a lobster, ending up on the menu in a luxurious Manhattan restaurant.

'You Can’t Go Home Again, and Here's Why' where a man allows a crew to shoot a film in his home on the understanding that he will be playing a pivotal acting role and doesn’t turn out quite like he hoped it would.

Allen chose the title ‘Zero Gravity’ to signify the lightweight and frivolous nature of the stories contained within but it strikes an unexpectedly profound and poignant note in its final tale. It's something of a cliché to glean autobiographical details from his work, often unfounded or greatly exaggerated, but 'Growing Up in Manhattan' certainly comes across that way. The story is an account of a young writer from Brooklyn, his failed first marriage, early career aspirations, love of Manhattan and what it symbolised to his younger self who enters a doomed affair with a free spirited Manhattanite. The ill-fated relationship comes to be a formative experience in his development as a writer, bringing knowledge, deeper themes and greater insight to his works as a playwright and humourist. I doubt the similarities with his own life story are coincidental. It could be seen as a charming offshoot of ‘Apropos of Nothing'. In a 1998 BBC interview Allen contemplated writing a novel and recently did confirm that he wrote one a while ago but it didn’t live up to his hopes for it. 'Growing Up in Manhattan' hints at what an Allen novel could be like and, who knows? He may yet surprise us. 

Allen's recent statement about his determination to continue as a writer strikes a defiant and ultimately triumphant note:

“I am an author and no one can prevent me from writing, and therefore from working. It is the guarantee of my freedom and my independence.”

Allen and his work will never cease to be a source of inspiration for me in both my own life and my writing. I should get this quote framed and hung up on my wall. 

In a podcast interview with Alec Baldwin on Instagram, Allen hinted that his directorial career may be coming to a close (at the age of 86, it's hard not to think that may be the case) and that his 50th feature, being filmed in France, may be his last but I hope there are many more published efforts still to look forward to.




* I'm boycotting the films of anyone who has denounced Allen and said they regret working with him, to appease the mob and (in their minds or at least their agents) not harm their own careers. Incidentally, Ch*lamet hasn't to my knowledge said anything against his Call Me By Your Name co-star and fellow blue blood Armie Hammer. It's spineless, ignorant, opportunistic, virtue-signalling narcissists like him that have all but destroyed mainstream American cinema.

** Other examples that come to mind, Max von Sydow in Hannah and Her Sisters, Elaine May in Small Time Crooks, Penelope Cruz in Vicky Cristina Barcelona and Antonio Banderas in You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger.

*** Having now put out the thoroughly one-sided Allen vs Farrow documentary on HBO (another hit piece with selective memory and distorted details) they may finally have realised that they have exploited the topic for all its worth, at least until R*nan Farrow finds another opportunity to further his career and carry out his mother’s sworn vendetta to destroy Allen’s career and reputation. Has there yet been any backlash to Lena Dunham’s new directorial effort, Sharp Stick, being released given that Dunham has herself been a subject of controversy and allegations of molesting her younger sister? Or for that matter, David O. Russell's forthcoming Amsterdam? Russell seems to have got off pretty lightly for someone who has been accused of sexual misconduct by his own niece and has had numerous reported incidents of verbal and physical abuse towards cast and crew on his film sets.

**** Although it is framed as an inconsequential Jazz Age champagne comedy in a lush setting, Magic in the Moonlight strikes me as one of Allen’s deepest and most thoughtful films. One of several latter day efforts that still hasn’t got its due - see also Whatever Works, Irrational Man and Café Society. It's a shame that C*lin Firth decided to be one of the self-serving, disloyal rats who decided to express their “regret” about working with Allen. His presence now sadly tarnishes what I consider to be one of my favourites of his work.

Recommended links:

Washington Examiner Review

Mia Farrow - 45 Undeniable Facts

‘Allen v. Farrow’ Review: Reprehensible Act of Media McCarthyism

Stuart Gordon: Interviews (Conversations with Filmmakers series)

Stuart Gordon: Interviews (Conversations with Filmmakers Series) 

Edited by Michael Doyle
University Press of Mississippi

I may have to consider buying another bookcase. My collection of film books is growing at an alarming rate and putting a serious strain on my bookshelves. This is something that the filmmaker Jamie Blanks tweeted about recently with a similar problem. 

Until this book of interviews came along I'd been able to find relatively little in print on the life and career of filmmaker Stuart Gordon, who passed away in March 2020. When the term "genre ghetto" is used it feels more appropriate with relation to typecasting and the level of the recognition a filmmaker achieves rather than the actual quality of their work. Written features in old journals, fanzines and interviews online have shed some light on the man and his work while DVD extras, booklets and audio commentaries have also been useful sources of information. I felt that such a distinctive filmmaker and body of work deserved a worthy volume on his career and when I heard about the University of Mississippi Press releasing a collection of interviews spanning from 1968 to the late 2010s, it almost sounded too good to be true.

Simply put, this is by far the best of the UoM series that I've encountered so far. Most of the other filmmakers they have done volumes on have been covered in greater detail elsewhere and have well documented careers in print but this collection felt revelatory. It illuminated such a great amount of detail about its subject, that I ended up taking notes from nearly every page. This spans the whole breadth of Gordon's career in both theatre and cinema and hearing about it from the man himself as his career progresses gives a direct commentary and narrative to proceedings. In certain cases, this is the first time that the interviews have been published in their entirety. 

Gordon is a very generous interviewee - informative, intelligent, honest, humourous, gracious and perceptive, with no delusions about his work or achievements. He's simply glad to hear that someone liked his films. Gordon flourished in the cult arena, never quite managing to draw attention away from the notoriety and shock value of his debut feature Re-Animator, which may be a reason why to this day he still seems like a hugely undervalued figure in American cinema, especially at a time when it seems that it has lost its ability to shock, provoke or even entertain in many cases. In a later interview he remarks, "Re-Animator has become my middle name". Like Tobe Hooper with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and George Romero with his 'Living Dead' films it was the work he was synonymous with. While graetful for how it launched his career it's a shame that other films didn't get as much of a following. I hope other films will get more attention as time passes. Books like this are very helpful in that respect. 

Stuart Gordon saw horror as a medium for subversion, a quality he shared with his forebears from the 1970s such as George Romero, David Cronenberg, Tobe Hooper, Wes Craven and John Carpenter. It's sometimes forgotten that the 1980s produced its own distinctive breed of filmmakers of this ilk. Along with Gordon there were such notable figures as Frank Henenlotter, Brian Yuzna, Michele Soavi, Jorg Buttgereit, Shinya Tsukamoto and Clive Barker making their mark as directors and they all sought to bring an incendiary quality to their work. It was far from being the era of derivative slashers and franchises that some make it out to be.

The book sheds light on his theatre work in which Gordon was an active participant in Chicago in the 1970s and early 1980s, a period which also saw such emerging talents as David Mamet, Dennis Franz, William L. Peterson, Joe Mantegna, Gary Sinise and William H. Macy launch their careers. This was where Gordon developed his rapport with actors and an ability to tackle ambitious subjects with limited resources but boundless imagination and creativity. Some of the projects - pirate adventures, science fiction - had a cinematic quality and as a lifelong movielover it made the transition to filmmaking a logical next step in his career. He already had experience with gore effects when the time came to make his first feature in 1985. 

The book made me aware of just how crucial the cinematographer Mac Ahlberg was to his work and how so many of the building blocks of Stuart Gordon's cinema were present in his debut film. Gordon reveals how Ahlberg taught him many of the fundamentals of filmmaking. There are numerous instances of this throughout film history, such as Gregg Toland schooling a young Orson Welles when he made Citizen Kane and Woody Allen said he learned a great deal about the technical side of cinema from Gordon Willis in his early work. His creative partnership with producer (and later director) Brian Yuzna reminded a little me of how Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur complimented each other in their seminal trio of RKO horror films in the 1940s. With Jeffrey Combs, Stuart Gordon found his ideal leading man and stock company member. He was a De Niro to his Scorsese, someone who occupied the worlds of his films so completely that it's hard to imagine anyone else in those roles (Herbert West in particular). Dennis Paoli was a lifelong friend of his who wrote numerous films for Gordon, some of which never made it beyond the initial screenplay stage. 

As well as discussing the films he did make we also learn a great deal about some of his unrealised projects. It's fascinating to learn about all the films that Gordon had hoped to make but was unable to get the required funds to bring them to fruition. Some of the projects discussed in the book include adaptations of Joe Haldeman's 'The Forever War' and Bret Easton Ellis's 'American Psycho', a pirate adventure titled 'Bloody Bess', 'Berserker' (written for Arnold Schwarzenegger), 'Florian', 'Iron Man', ''68' (an autobiographical film about his involvement in late-1960s activism and the founding of The Organic Theatre), 'Kingdom Come', 'House of Re-Animator', 'Gris Gris', Soulmate (a ghost story that was eventually directed by its writer Axelle Carolyn, with Gordon's blessing) and at least two further proposed Lovecraft adaptations: The Lurking Fear and The Thing on the Doorstep. At least we have The Black Cat, one of his two 'Masters of Horror' episodes and something of a dry run for his play 'Nevermore', a one man show for Jeffrey Combs which he also hoped to turn in to a film. He gives his approval for Abel Ferrara's work on 1993's Body Snatchers, another film that Gordon was lined up to make before it got caught up in major studio politics and one that came out remarkably well under the circumstances. Earlier in the book, there are several mentions of a film version of Lovecraft's story 'The Shadow Over Innsmouth' as far back as 1986. It was initially planned as his follow-up effort to Re-Animator so it's heartening to know it would finally get made as Dagon in 2001.

It seems nearly every filmmaker has a cursed production at some stage in their career and Robot Jox certainly had more than its fair share of setbacks. External factors beyond the filmmaker's control are made clear. Don Coscarelli shares similar stories in his autobiography 'True Indie', with relation to Bubba-Ho-Tep. Gordon talks about how 'Fear Itself' was taken off the air half way through the season to make room for the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Despite decent ratings the remaining shows weren't broadcast when the games were over. Of the films that did get made he laments that certain titles never got a chance to find an audience in cinemas, in particular The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (made for Disney's Home Video division) which got caught up in a dispute between warring factions at the head of Disney and Dagon (which went straight to DVD). It's especially galling today when the multiplexes have become such a wasteland. Like many others, I discovered Gordon's work on VHS and later DVD, a reminder of how pivotal home viewing has been for film lovers over the last 40 years or so. He points out that Robot Jox did very well on VHS, despite its reputation as a flop. The home video market allowed his films to find an audience in ways that cinema distribution never could. 

Severe stress and health concerns surrounded the making of Honey, I Shrunk the Kids and eventually forced him to drop out two weeks before the film was scheduled to begin shooting. He says that the finished film is not too far removed from what he set out to make, because much of it resembled the work he had already planned and storyboarded. It could have taken his career in a very different direction and garnered other major studio assignments. It's a fascinating "what if?", much like with David Lynch being offered a chance to make Return of the Jedi in the early 1980s. I consider the period from Robot Jox (1989) through Daughter of Darkness (1990) and The Pit and the Pendulum (1991) to Fortress (1992) to be the least impressive stretch of his career. Just for the record, I still find all of these films to be highly watchable but I think they lack some of the zest of his best work. The professional struggles he encountered and difficulties working with studio meddling as well as the many projects that floundered in Development Hell may have had a detrimental effect on his work but there is never a stage in his career where one might have lost faith in his abilities.

He accurately predicted there may not be too many more films left in a 2006 interview. It's sad to read during the most productive phase of his film career that he wasn't sure how many films he had remaining in him and made me wonder how long his health issues (his death in 2020 was a result of multiple organ failure) were effecting him. Many film enthusiasts didn't realise how lucky we all were to have John Carpenter until he stepped away from directing after the hostile reception to Ghosts of Mars in 2001. Gordon's film career similarly came to an abrupt end. That no new films would get made by him after Stuck is a perfect example of the sorry state of American film since the financial crash. If such a thing doesn't already exist, there is probably a great thought piece to be written on US cinema since 2008 and how the industry has gradually bottled out of investing in any project that carries the slightest element of risk, uncertainty or even vaguely challenging ideas, something that has been exacerbated by the rise of streaming platforms.

After reading this collection, Stuart Gordon's post-2008 career now seems like a much more productive and fruitful period than I had previously thought. For a long time I held out hope that another feature would get made but I should have been searching elsewhere. Despite several film projects failing to get off the ground, resulting in a huge array of unproduced scripts, he remained active in other fields, and got to make acclaimed theatre work, a radio play and an autobiography (see below). The later theatre projects 'Nevermore: An Evening with Edgar Allan Poe',* 'Taste' and 'Re-Animator: The Musical'** all sound like  he was open to risky and challenging new ventures. There was also the radio play "The Hound" from Tales From Beyond the Pale, which actually gives us a further addition (or addendum) to his series of Lovecraft adaptations. This collection also made me aware of other projects he was involved in and I made sure to add The Dentist and Progeny (both of which he co-wrote) to the top of my rental list. Like Joe Dante (another worthy subject for film studies), Gordon was an engaging cinephile and made several entertaining contributions to the Trailers from Hell website in which he covered films such as Nightmare Alley, Ride the High Country, Mr. Sardonicus and Cannibal Holocaust. A chapter where he discusses two of his favourite filmmakers - Roman Polanski and Stanley Kubrick is full of great insights in to their work and what made makes them masters of their craft. It also contains lovely tributes from the likes of Barbara Crampton, that really brings home what made his work so special and a splendidly detailed bibliography of articles and weblinks. 

While scrolling through the bibliography I noticed a mention of 'Naked Theatre and Uncensored Horror', a book written by Gordon with a 2022 publication date. This had escaped my attention until now but it seems that Gordon had written his memoirs prior to his death two years ago and FAB Press had announced in 2020 that it will be publishing the book in the near future. Wonderful news and much like with Tobe Hooper it seems that fans and film scholars will have two incredible resources to draw on for assessing this remarkable career with plenty of information coming directly from the subject himself. At one point Gordon states: "I think movies have life spans" (pg. 65) and his work certainly lives on and only gains in stature as a result of this excellent collection. Already a major highlight of 2022 for me.

* A one-man show, featuring Jeffrey Combs as Poe. I don't think there is a film or audio version of this show available. Gordon was interested in doing a film version but according to Combs, he was opposed to the idea of doing a taping of the show.

** It's a source of regret now that I may have been able to see a performance of this at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival had I known about it sooner.

Links:

FAB Press announcement: https://twitter.com/fab_press/status/1557692979393007618

FilmInt book review by Thomas M. Puhr: http://filmint.nu/stuart-gordon-interviews-michael-doyle-review-thomas-m-puhr/

Wicked Horror.com review: https://wickedhorror.com/horror-reviews/stuart-gordon-interviews-a-singularly-subversive-spirit-book-review/

'Apropos of Nothing' by Woody Allen

In light of current events, I'm grateful for any causes for joy that can be found in 2020. As a longtime fan of Woody Allen, I have recently had two reasons to be cheerful.

Despite the best efforts of a glorified witch-hunt and the cancel culture of social media, Allen's autobiography, titled Apropos of Nothing, has been published by Arcade. Shortly before the recent release it had been dropped at the last minute by Grand Central/Hachette when they caved in to a manufactured outrage which advocated censorship and blacklisting.

There have been rumours of Allen writing an autobiography for years and it was a mouthwatering prospect. He's already proved himself to be a fine writer, with dozens of screenplays to his name as well as stage plays and published prose works. I'm really glad that the book exists and it is an entertaining and enlightening read. I read the whole thing within 3 days. For a slow reader like me this is the equivalent of setting a marathon record. For anyone interested in the man and his work or who just want to educate themselves about a much misunderstood and misreported subject I wholeheartedly recommended it.

The sad part for me is that the stories about Allen's personal life from the early 1990s should really have been relegated to a footnote of his career by now. The current wave of new age McCarthyism has perhaps forced Woody Allen to tell his side of the story in print. As someone who has never believed the accusation that was levelled against him I'm one of the readers that didn't need to read about the saga at such length as it's already been well documented elsewhere. Unfortunately, ignorance and falsehoods persist and it has got to a stage where Allen's filmmaking career has been jeopardised. Now 84 years old, as a married man with two adopted daughters who must be affected by all the vile mudslinging that has been going on in recent years I imagine he wanted to make a statement with this book, which gives a lengthy and well detailed rebuttal to the claims made against him.

The middle section of the book is unfortunately burdened with being a necessary corrective to innumerable inaccuracies and false narratives about Allen's life that have proliferated over the years. Earlier in the book however, the accounts of his childhood in Brooklyn, lifelong love of New Orleans jazz, years as a TV writer and success as a stand-up comedian are a pleasure to read. He also chronicles his relationships with the actresses Louise Lasser (who he was married to), Diane Keaton, Stacey Nelkin and M*a Farrow, all of whom had a major impact on his work and development as a writer and director. Farrow is unavoidably a major talking point in the book. Their partnership on and off screen lasted over a decade. During this time they lived apart but would share parental duties on two children they adopted and also have a son together (although Farrow has since claimed that R*nan's father may actually be Frank Sinatra). She starred in 13 of his films and despite the fallout he gives credit where it's due, praising her growth as an actress. Farrow showed an exceptional range in Allen's work and gave remarkable performances in films like Broadway Danny Rose and Radio Days. 

Having made so many films, several are only fleetingly mentioned. Allen has an at best modest and at worst damning view of a lot of his work. I found it interesting that he calls 1993's Manhattan Murder Mystery "one of the best films I ever made". It's one I've always liked but I had considered it to be a lightweight and minor work. Having not seen it in more than 20 years his enthusiasm for it makes me want to give it a rewatch. He also speaks well of The Purple Rose of Cairo, Husbands and Wives and Bullets Over Broadway but feels the final act of Hannah and Her Sisters was a cop-out and he has a very harsh judgement of films such as Manhattan, September and Another Woman. Although he was as entertaining as ever in The Curse of the Jade Scorpion I do agree with him that he was the wrong actor for the lead role.

There is a slightly meandering quality to some of the later chapters, with quite a few random anecdotes that don't add much of interest and feel like extra padding. Allen freely admits to living a charmed life at this stage and seems grateful for what he has. It's great to learn that his marriage to Soon-Yi seems to have been very happy and fulfilling for him. He's been able to get on with his life and has maintained an impeccable work ethic, having done several tours with his jazz band and he is still making a new film each year as writer and director. I really hope the final word hasn't been written on Allen's life, career and legacy despite a sustained hate campaign that is hellbent on destroying his career and reputation.

Ever since Vicky Cristina Barcelona came out in early 2009 I have watched every new feature film directed by Woody Allen at the cinema. It was something I looked forward to each year. In 2018 I caught Wonder Wheel during its initial release in the UK, and I did have suspicions at the time that it may be my last chance to see his latest title on the big screen because of ever growing condemnation in the media from R*nan Farrow and his pathetic, hate-filled minions. Little did I know that a couple of years later the theatrical experience itself would be in such a perilous state.

The second bit of good news that has surfaced is that Allen's most recent film, A Rainy Day in New York, is finally being released in the UK on VOD services in June and on DVD in July. In late 2018 the finished film was shelved by Amazon studios, who also ended their production deal with Allen, due to a hostile press and pressure from the same witch-hunt that cancelled the publication by Hachette. Although still without a release in the USA it was eventually distributed in sensible and civilised parts of Europe and the rest of the world that didn't see an issue with releasing the film. I have been tempted to get a foreign DVD of the film since February but held out hope that sanity would prevail and a UK release is now finally going ahead. It's at least a year overdue to my mind but better late than never.

Recommended reading:

'A Son Speaks Out' by Moses Farrow

The Case for Woody Allen's Innocence by Jordan Ruimy (from WorldofReel.com)

The Truth About The Ten Undeniable Facts of Vanity Fair in Relation to the Allegation of Sexual Abuse of Dylan Farrow Against Woody Allen