Review of Deconstructing Harry (1997) by Tom B — 08 Aug 2010

So tonight my buddy comes by, this is before my daughter's left with her aunt, and we tell him how much she loved Annie Hall, and my younger son is going to his mother's, but my buddy wants to watch a movie.

It's just us, so he wants Woody Allen, picks this one he's never seen. What a great movie! Post Husbands and Wives, similar style, but softer, Woody canvassing himself, doing his own inventory, owning shit, looking at it.

Reminded of Bergman, of course, delicate scenes of self-introspection intercut with savage Ibsen-like (is it Ibsen, or that other Swedish playwrite?) exposés of couples arguing. And Woody's owning his shit, and it's funny, and sad, as he does, kind of like Chaplin meets Bergman, with a bit of Tarantino thrown in.

And it's nice, you know? Nice to see another guy up there not understanding why he sometimes does the crap he does in relationships, or understanding but still doing it, or learning after the fact, and me and my buddy, well, of course we're looking at this and nodding our heads because, you know, we understand.

And that's okay, no point in pretending, right? Two guys, watching a movie, the kids are away, and what's the topic? Women? The absence of women? "Women are God," Woody says. Yes, that's right.

But then, we keep fucking it up! Ha! Though, of course, they add to it plenty, we know this, but still. And so the comfort in art, or understanding, or friendship. Then later my son comes home from work, my older son, and my buddy's gone and my son and I watch interviews with the two guys from My Dinner With Andre and it's all about friendship, interviews I might add given by our favorite director, one of them anyway, Noah Baumbach, you know, who made Squid and The Whale and several other great films about relationships between men and women, and families.

Like Woody's movies, also about family and being Jewish and the whole deal, and being creative and story and that whole thing. Nice to know no one's really alone.