Deconstructing Harry - 1997 * * * *

I love Woody Allen. I think he is a total genius and I adore his style of directing, producing and acting in his films. What many people dislike about him I lap up, eager for more. The way he can make a scene look like it has just been improvised on the spot and his nervous and nerdy exterior is perfect. He also has some really brilliant ideas in film-making and you can tell how much of a film he has been an active part in when you watch it. I am aware that he plays pretty much the same panicked looking character in all his films but again that is what I like about him. I love to be able to recognise that it is a Woody Allen film from the start.

This movie is really about writer's block. And the writer is Woody Allen. His books are written with no regard to his friends or family whom he thinly veils by changing simply one letter in their name when he lists all their negative points. As you can tell this doesn't win him any brownie points and most of the film seems to mix the reality of his life as a writer and the life of his characters. I love how it switches from one reality to the other so fast. In his mind, both seperate lives are equally real to him which makes it all very confusing. At the same time his strong feelings for a woman he meets in the real world becomes tangled with the relationship of ihs characters in his fantasy world. An excellent idea, an original idea and of course if Woody Allen is involved then it's a prize-winning idea. A brilliant cast is like the icing on the cake with this type of movie. Woody Allen is supported by Elizabeth Shue, Kirstie Alley, Billy Crystal and a young looking Tobey Maguire. He nearly always gives the largest parts to other stars and stands back a little to admire his work but in this thankfully he took the reigns and made the entire movie based on himself.

Immediately after watching this I was online downloading another handful of his films, hoping that I would find yet another gem amoungst them. So far I haven't seen a single dud in all the films of his that I have seen (whether they were him as a director, a producer or an actor), and I don't think it is likely to happen. He is just a one off.