About a year ago, a friend of mine posed a theory about Woody Allen's Manhattan: the film's merit hinges a great deal on one's own experiences with the titular town. Essentially, the more you love Manhattan, the more you'll love Manhattan. This was a criticism of the film I disagreed with at the time, mostly because I liked the film and had never visited the city.
In August, I spent my first few days in New York City.
I had an opportunity to see Manhattan on the big screen there -- to really put the above theory to the test -- but it didn't work in my schedule. So, last week, I finally revisited the film, to see if my real-life experiences had tainted my views of the film.
I can say for certain that I get the film more. More so, I think I get all of Woody's NCY films a little better after having spent an afternoon sitting on a park bench listening to a jazz band in Central Park, or an hour getting lost on the subway. Manhattan is all about romanticizing reality, and I've certainly never been to a place that begs to be romanticized more than New York City. Any serious look at Allen's body of work will reveal this as his main thematic concern: not neurotic comedy, not relationship woes, but the dichotomy between fantasy/romanticism (Manhattan) and reality (Manhattan the place). Just the above image -- park bench, jazz band, Central Park -- is so steeped in romantic NYC iconography it's downright silly. But I really did spend an afternoon doing that. Was I trying to live out what Allen had shown me in his movies? Had I been so intoxicated by Allen's idealized image of New York City that I actually made a pilgrimage to the exact spot of the "I lurve you" scene in Annie Hall? (see above photo)
The answer, of course, is yes. By the time I finally reached New York City at the age of 22, I had been so thoroughly primed by Allen's films that the real city was like a punch to the gut. Allen makes movies to divert himself from reality; for me, visiting the city was to take a five-day vacation into one of his films, to escape wholly from real life into a place I had been cultivated to view with the rosiest possible lens. Sure, the disparity between the rich and the poor was despicable, and it would cripple me financially to actually live there...but, damn, there are jazz bands and cinemas everywhere, and I can get around without a car, and there's the best in low- and high-brow cuisine, and you get the idea. The city seemed as if it were designed in a dream -- or, better still, a movie.
So, how did I view Manhattan after spending time in Manhattan? I liked the film more. The city revealed many shades of the film I had missed in previous viewings. But, as with many of his films, Allen's movies have a sense of universality that transcends a specific place. Just as Bill Murray bemoaned"She's my Rushmore" in that Wes Anderson film, I think you can watch a Woody Allen film and connect his passion for NYC with your own individual passion. The film seems to ask "What's your Manhattan?" What's that thing you're drawn to and repelled by at the same time? What's that thing you long to possess and experience, despite knowing it could very well be the end of you?
After three viewings of Manhattan and one trip to Manhattan, I'm discovering my answer to that question: Manhattan or Manhattan, the city or the cinema, reality or fantasy? I'll let you know when I figure that one out.
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