The plot of Annie Hall is the basic- boy meets girl; boy loses girl; boy tries to get girl back; boy is better off without her. The main characters of Annie Hall are Annie Hall and Alvy Singer. The film follows the course of their relationship, how they meet, dates the go on, fights they get into, problems in the bedroom and so fourth. Both are neurotic, self-conscious people who are constantly trying to deal with their own personal problems on top of their relationship. The main goal of the film is to portray how a relationship is thought about from a woman’s point of view (Bjorkman. 78). Like a number of Woody Allen films, the overall tone is very cynical.
What Was Going on Historically in 1977:
Culturally, at that time, it was the height of the hippie movement. People were rebelling against gender roles and sexuality stereotypes. This was done in life as well as art. When Woody Allen wrote Annie Hall, he challenged these gender roles by creating the Annie Hall character. During the hippie era, women fought against stereotypical gender roles. Historically, women had been known to take a back seat to decision making and professional works and the hippie era gave women freedom to fight against that oppression. They became providers for their families and started to work their way up in the workforce, taking jobs other than teachers and secretaries. Annie Hall is a strong character who seems to be the more superior person in her relationship with Alvy. Woody Allen said that before Annie Hall, he wrote scripts from a man’s point of view. Because of the strong women who had influenced him in the movie business, he wrote Annie Hall from a woman’s point of view (Bjorkman, 86).
Mise En Scene Analysis:
One of the main aspects of mise en scene that really supports Woody Allen’s idea of women fighting their old-fashioned gender roles would have to be Diane Keaton’s costumes during the film. She wears ties, vests
, and manly hats in practically every scene. This was Allen’s way of letting Keaton have the freedom to be creative with her wardrobe and let her decide how a character such as Annie Hall would have dressed. The outfit also represents an alternative style at the time the film was made. Many women were wearing manly clothes, such as tuxedos that were more feminized and fitting. This was their way of challenging the gender roles and proving that women can do exactly what men can starting with wearing the same clothes (Bjorkman. 85). Woody Allen used many long-running shots, which is a scene that runs the entire time without a cut. Allen decided not to cut these scenes because that is what real verbal communication is. There are no cuts and the interruptions in normal life, the only cuts he includes are those that would usually occur in everyday life. In conversations with men and women in many films at that time, men dominate most of the conversation and women either agree or do not say anything at all. In Annie Hall, the characters share the conversation and each person’s lines are heard.In Annie Hall, Woody Allen focuses greatly on the density of what is included in the frame. In many of the scenes, long shots are used so that the audience can chose what to focus on. In these scenes, Woody Allen is trying to give each character equal face time. When a director uses long shots for an extended length of time, he is focusing on the characters as well as their surrounding environment. Allen is famous for his love of
Ways the Film Comments on Gender, Sexuality, and Relationships:
Woody Allen’s character, Alvy does not understand women and their emotions. Many people in society associate a negative change in a woman’s attitude with her menstruation period, which is the only reason Alvy ever thinks for a woman being upset. His famous quote in Annie
Hall is when Alvy says, “You’re just upset. You must be getting your period.” This demonstrates a man’s logic for why a woman would be upset. Many times, Alvy just does not even think that Annie could be upset with something he did, so he assumes that it was something he has no control over. Many times in films, when a man mentions that the woman is upset due to her period, they are trying to be disrespectful on purpose because he knows how mad it makes a woman. In Annie Hall, Alvy is simply naïve and really thinks that it must be her period. This part in the movie demonstrates the gender issue that society has conditioned us to believe that periods make women edgy and mean. The way Woody Allen makes this part comical means that society is learning and knows that if a woman is upset, it probably has nothing to do with her having her period. Women can get upset about numerous things, just like men can.Woody Allen and Diane Keaton have had an extremely close personal and professional relationship throughout their time working together on Allen’s many films staring Keaton. He has said that it was Diane who showed him how to see things from a woman’s point of view. He wrote Annie Hall specifically so that Keaton could play the lead. Her freedom-loving spirit and overall outlook on life are mirrored in Annie Hall’s character. Allen said that he wrote Annie Hall from a woman’s point of view and wanted that woman to seem superior because he felt that the point of view of a woman was a new way of seeing the world on film.
Memorable Quote:
Annie Hall focuses on how both men and women differ in sexual relationships. Woody Allen shows how differently they think, when he has both Annie and Alvy seeing their respective therapists during a split screen shot. The respective therapists ask them, “How often do you have sex?” Alvy responds with, “Hardly ever. Maybe three times a week.” While Annie, on the other hand, says, “Constantly. I’d say three times a week.” This was Allen’s way of showing the difference between men and women’s thinking in the sexual sense. Because men think of sex thousands of times a day, having sex three times a week does not seem like a lot. For women, they do not think of sex as often so having it three times a week seems like a lot. This quote is very interesting because it truly shows the different ways each gender thinks about sex.
