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A Rainy Day in New York
One of the Woodmeister's lesser efforts, 2019's A Rainy day in New York is a pretentious and talky comedy centered around the prominent theme of most of Woody Allen's work, the glory that is New York City, but is eventually weighed down by overly sophisticated writing and fuzzy characterizations.
Gatsby Welles is a pampered young college student and semi-professional gambler who comes from a very wealthy family who plans a weekend in New York with his girlfriend, Ashleigh Enright, also from a wealthy family, who has somehow managed to land an interview with an important movie director. Gatsby plans to spend the day doing New York with Ashleigh and then taking her to a party being thrown by his parents, but a series of bizarre incidents separate the couple and keep them apart for most of the weekend.
This is actually the kind of comedy that Woody would have written for himself and Diane Keaton thirty years ago. As a matter of fact, as the movie began, it took a minute for me to realize that the leading man was serving as narrator and not Allen himself. Woody's love of Manhattan is once again center stage, but the story is overly complex in its dialogue and execution, not to mention the characters just don't seem to meld with Woody's sophisticated dialogue and often seems to be talking above his audience.
As one of Woody's greatest champions, I really wanted to like this one, but his writing is so much more complex than the characters and even the actors seem a little thrown by the overly wordy screenplay. It was also hard to buy the 45 year old angry New Yorker inside the 19 year old college student that Woody creates in this kid Gatsby Welles. I just didn't buy this kid breezing through school as a professional gambler and being into New York piano bars and Gershwin. There was actually a line in the movie where Gatsby states that instead of a drink, he needs a romantic piano ballad...seriously? And the fact that the Ashleigh character's brain was removed for several scenes in the movie only added to her irritation factor, which was actually at a fever pitch from her opening scene.
Oscar nominee Timothee Chalamet (Call Me By Your Name) never quite convinces as Gatsby and Elle Fanning is pretty annoying as Ashleigh. There is some flashy support provided along the way from Liev Schreiber, Jude Law, and Cherry Jones, but this one just barely holds viewer attention. Research revealed that, with the exception of New York Stories, for which Woody only provided a third of the screenplay, this is the first and only film he's made with the words "New York" in the title, despite his well-known love of the city. Too bad the vehicle wasn't more worthy of the distinction.
One of the Woodmeister's lesser efforts, 2019's A Rainy day in New York is a pretentious and talky comedy centered around the prominent theme of most of Woody Allen's work, the glory that is New York City, but is eventually weighed down by overly sophisticated writing and fuzzy characterizations.
Gatsby Welles is a pampered young college student and semi-professional gambler who comes from a very wealthy family who plans a weekend in New York with his girlfriend, Ashleigh Enright, also from a wealthy family, who has somehow managed to land an interview with an important movie director. Gatsby plans to spend the day doing New York with Ashleigh and then taking her to a party being thrown by his parents, but a series of bizarre incidents separate the couple and keep them apart for most of the weekend.
This is actually the kind of comedy that Woody would have written for himself and Diane Keaton thirty years ago. As a matter of fact, as the movie began, it took a minute for me to realize that the leading man was serving as narrator and not Allen himself. Woody's love of Manhattan is once again center stage, but the story is overly complex in its dialogue and execution, not to mention the characters just don't seem to meld with Woody's sophisticated dialogue and often seems to be talking above his audience.
As one of Woody's greatest champions, I really wanted to like this one, but his writing is so much more complex than the characters and even the actors seem a little thrown by the overly wordy screenplay. It was also hard to buy the 45 year old angry New Yorker inside the 19 year old college student that Woody creates in this kid Gatsby Welles. I just didn't buy this kid breezing through school as a professional gambler and being into New York piano bars and Gershwin. There was actually a line in the movie where Gatsby states that instead of a drink, he needs a romantic piano ballad...seriously? And the fact that the Ashleigh character's brain was removed for several scenes in the movie only added to her irritation factor, which was actually at a fever pitch from her opening scene.
Oscar nominee Timothee Chalamet (Call Me By Your Name) never quite convinces as Gatsby and Elle Fanning is pretty annoying as Ashleigh. There is some flashy support provided along the way from Liev Schreiber, Jude Law, and Cherry Jones, but this one just barely holds viewer attention. Research revealed that, with the exception of New York Stories, for which Woody only provided a third of the screenplay, this is the first and only film he's made with the words "New York" in the title, despite his well-known love of the city. Too bad the vehicle wasn't more worthy of the distinction.