by David C. Terr

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Title: Annie Hall

Director: Woody Allen

Starring: Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, Tony Roberts, Christopher Walken, Carol Kane, Paul Simon

Release Date: Apr. 20, 1977

Running Time: 93 min

Genres: Comedy, Romance

Commentary
Annie Hall is a classic Woody Allen romantic comedy which explores the nature of sexual relationships. With several very funny and witty lines as well as sophistocated humor, Annie Hall is a showcase of Woody Allen's comic genius. At the same time, it has some very deep and somewhat depressing messages regarding life, love, and relationships.

Plot Summary
Annie Hall is narrated by a Alvy Singer (Woody Allen), a neurotic Jewish comedian from New York. He talks about various stages of his life throughout the film, but mostly about his relationships with women, in particular with Annie Hall (Diane Keaton), a rather proper Catholic girl he meets at a fitness center. Alvy briefly discusses his childhood growing up in Brooklyn (under the roller coaster). He then quickly flashes forward to Annie, and the two end up reminiscing about several of his past experiences. Alvy and Annie have a good relationship for awhile, but it gradually becomes tainted by their differences. Eventually it ends when Annie decides to move to Los Angeles but Alvy insists on staying in New York. By the end of the movie, Alvy concludes that relationships are completely irrational, but we hang on to them because "we need the eggs".

Philosophy
Woody Allen uses Annie Hall to express some of his philosophies of life.

• Near the beginning of the movie, Alvy is shown as a child of about ten complaining that "the universe is expanding" and trying to argue that one day it will break apart, so nothing we do should matter.
• In a bookstore, he tells Annie that their are two types of people in the world, the horrible and the miserable, the horrible being handicapped people and the miserable being everyone else, so we should thank God we're miserable.
• He comes to conclusions about how to be happy by interviewing a happy looking couple on the street, who both tell them that they're basically shallow and uninteresting, which is why they're happy.

Movie Clips

Here's the movie opening.

Here's a scene of Alvy at age ten, expressing his fatalist philosophy.

Here's a funny clip with Alvy and Annie in line for a movie.

Here's a funny scene in which Alvy's elementary school classmates tell what's happened to them later in life.

Here's a freaky scene involving Annie's crazy cousin Dwain.