The script is smart and provokes intriguing ideas. Woody Allen himself, the quintessential neurotic New Yorker, might have a thing or two to say about the raves. But almost 50 years since his first screenplay 's "What's New Pussycat" and his directorial debut 's "What's Up, Tiger Lily" , Hollywood begs to differ.
Allen's writing and directing have earned him more than 20 Oscar nominations, and he was even nominated once for Best Actor for his role in Annie Hall, which won a total of four Academy Awards in , including best picture. Through all the decades of accolades, Woody Allen has consistently shunned awards shows. Already this season, he skipped the Oscar nominees' luncheon and took a pass on the Golden Globes, where "Midnight in Paris" won best screenplay.
Back in , when his funny, futuristic hit "Sleeper" was ignored by the Academy, Allen was quoted as saying, "The whole concept of awards is silly. I cannot abide by the judgment of other people, because if you accept it when they say you deserve an award, then you have to accept it when they say you don't.
Just yesterday, in a very similar ethical firefight here in Israel, a decision was made not to give a Lifetime Achievement award to controversial singer Ariel Zilber. I looked elsewhere for guidance, and considered how the sports industry deals with these matters. Sure, if he violated professional protocol, by cheating or using performance-enhancing drugs, he would be disqualified and stripped of his honors.
Their professional merits were seen as separate to their personal lack thereof. Just like Olympic medals, Academy Awards are measures of professional — not personal — merit. And really, they should be. The venue for retribution or exoneration is the court of law. The legend went that he got hooked on smack and took too much acid one day and never shook himself out of the trip.
That was what was left of the s in Ojai in the s. I found my way to Woody Allen the way you find a new swimming hole people only find out about through word of mouth — you want to go every day and tell no one else about it until you got sick of swimming there.
The only way to see Woody movies was to rent them. But he was still making movies through the s and the s. When the Soon-Yi scandal erupted my own opinion towards him and his work shifted. I saw him differently then. I no longer saw him as the hero he imagined himself to be in, say, Manhattan where he confronts Michael Murphy and always painted himself as someone imperfect but ethical.
I could not square the person I had baked into my DNA with someone who would do that to Mia and their family. Around I got online.
I was immediately attacked and practically ejected from the group. I learned my lesson about separating the art from the man. But that was then, needless to say, this is now. I also eventually figured out that Woody Allen might play the character with the most ethics and morality in his films his films are also a dialogue with characters who wrestle with big moral dilemmas, like Crimes and Misdemeanors or Stardust Memories or Another Woman.
That was before the HBO documentary dropped. And this is why I bring this up now. The filmmakers and Hornaday have a conversation about that:. You contend with the work in front of you. AZ: The world is filled with brilliant, flawed people. But you can make a choice when you realize your economically supporting them allows them to do awful things, and allows to give cover to the awful things. And there is a one-to-one translation of that.
As they accrue more power, they accrue more protection. Just sitting with that discomfort. Watching any Woody Allen movie now, or frankly any film made in the last 50 years, is a slightly uncomfortable experience. You watch every scene with a running ticker in your head pointing out the things that Twitter would flip out about if it was presented to them. My daughter and I watched Scent of a Woman, which is a perfectly enjoyable film except that Al Pacino sexually harasses women throughout.
Like if Adolf Hitler was awarded a Nobel prize. Every other holder pretty much throws that award in the trash at that point. Any official notation on the subject is pretty easily found through Google searching. I added this blurb just to give a personal note. I work for an agency that just won the top award at some thing I don't care about. But my not caring about it is why I can relate to Woody Allen on this subject.
I simply cannot find it in me to concern myself with what a panel of people have decided is the best. It seems so self serving, and reciprocal. What a silly little game. Sign up to join this community. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top.
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