Review of Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993) by Shawne ~ — 03 Jul 2004

[i]Manhattan Murder Mystery[/i] is the little suspense thriller Woody Allen never got to make with [i]Annie Hall[/i]. As he tells it, he had a little murder mystery plot going for Alvy Singer and Annie, but found that the relationship between the two was more intriguing than the mystery. So he excised it, and fittingly, some twenty years later, Allen reunites with his best female co-star Diane Keaton for a kooky film set in (where else?) New York that sees his uptight, neurotic Larry Lipton try to rein in his wife Carol, who believes they've chanced upon a murder committed right down the hall. As Carol spins her wild theories, sneaks into apartments and tracks down all the leads she fortuituously (or crazily) trips over, Allen sneaks in a little romance and social commentary on the way -- Larry's unwillingness to participate in Carol's wackiness sees her confiding more in their mutual friend Ted (Alan Alda). Ted is open to her suggestions, and openly in crush with her, which makes him perfectly receptive and her husband... well, not. But when Larry finally gets in on the whole deal, will he be too late to save Carol from the mess she's gotten herself into?

MMM is really so hard to put into a neat little package, because it's a tiny film, in its way (hardly any budget needed, it appears, being filmed entirely in the buildings and streets of New York), and yet sprawls in every direction. Allen's trademark wit is present and accounted for, though artfully buried in the film's almost documentary-like style. The camera follows the Liptons almost as if documenting every scene. There's no neat dialogue like audiences of today is used to: everything feels natural and off-the-cuff, and more often than not, choice lines are left buried beneath other lines and reactions from the actors seem almost disarmingly unforced. While it takes some getting used to, it quickly draws one into the Liptons' lives. Allen's clever use of an old movie cinema as the background for his climactic shootout--set against the gorgeous backdrop of [i]Double Indemnity[/i]--is entertaining and surprisingly effective.

Allen also sneaks his sweet little romance under the radar, as Larry and Carol spend so much time arguing and drifting apart (her towards Ted and him towards Anjelica Huston's Marcia Fox) that Larry's very genuine horror when Carol is put in danger at the end seems doubly sweet for all the snipy banter that went before it. Allen and Keaton play opposite each other like people who've known and loved each other their whole lives--like a perfect, comfortable fit, and yet familiar enough to have the type of prickly conversations old married couples do. When Larry and Carol finally meet again at the end (for though they were never quite physically apart, but emotionally so), it's quite a heart-lightening reunion.

Though perhaps not one of Allen's finest, it certainly is his best picture in recent memory, and is a real sweetheart of a movie. Here's hoping he manages to get in another collaboration with Keaton at some point in the future--theirs is a chemistry that would be murder to waste.