Saturday, 5 April 2014

The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985)

Given how upset I am with news from Woody Allen’s personal life, I had decided to take a long break from watching his movies. On one Saturday, I rushed into the drawing room when the music seemed familiar and Mia Farrow appeared on screen. The sibling was surprised to see how I had figured that it was a movie by Woody Allen without watching a scene - she was just about to switch channels.

I broke my promise of taking a long break from his movies.

I watched the last half-hour of The Purple Rose of Cairo. A movie character steps out of the movie and enters the real world. He interacts with movie buff Cecilia, who is in an unhappy marriage. It took me a while to get used to Cecilia (character played by Mia Farrow) interacting with two men, both played by Jeff Daniels.

What I noticed this time was that while there are strong female characters in Allen’s movies, they get a raw deal by the time the movie ends. I also heard mentions of Leslie Howard (“I could have been played by Fredric March or Leslie Howard”) – the actor who played Ashley Wilkes in Gone with the Wind.

Watch the trailer.

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