Comments on Woody Allen and Cassandra's Dream

I won't give away anything of the plot of Cassandra's Dream beyond what John's given below. I just want to say that I agree the movie probably shouldn't have been made. It is quite simple compared to a list of films from the past (such as the ones John mentioned) as well as the current release Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, which I really hope everyone gets to see.

What bothered me about the film is its on the nose dialogue. Allen is usually a sure hand at crafting believable banter that carries the point across without handing it to you in a fast food container. Here, the dialogue felt more like his notes of what he wanted the scenes to be about, and rather than spend the time to bury the meaning beneath the dialogue, he just had the characters spell it out for you like a freshman novelist. This is okay for his comedies, where Allen can play it broad, but not for a drama of any weight or merit.

I'm just going to come out and say it: I think Woody Allen needs to slow down. He's always averaged about one film a year, but of late quantity has not spelled quality. Match Point would have been a great film if Allen had bothered to craft believable cop dialogue and cast believable cop actors instead of the idiots he employed. And the plot hole of why didn't she mention in her diary that he had gotten her pregnant is unforgivable. He may have realized this if he had bothered to take a breather between projects, but he just keeps on pumping them out one after another, and the projects suffer in light of this. I mean, nobody's going to tell Woody Allen to slow down, and nobody's going to tell the world's most acclaimed screenwriter that there are holes in his plot, that the cogs are not meshing, or that his script just plain sucks.

Cassandra's Dream is an average film, but I don't want average from Woody Allen.