Review of You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger (2010) by Guido M — 15 Jul 2012

"You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger is a sexy and funny story about obsession, that with a great cast and talented Mr Allen in writing and direction, it cannot fail".

Woody has felt in love with London, as this is the second movie after Match Point in the Woody Allen tour around Europe. Although You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger does not show much London as Match Point, Woody keeps the erotic touches of the previous one, only a little bit lower.

The movie starts a little bit messy and hard to follow, but you get interested in the characters immediately. Woody presents as usual, only one base story and other 3 that are connected, even in the silliest way, to that base story. Of course, that one is about astrology and predictions.

Woody does not spoofes gypsis or astrology, just take that situation to develop it into typical Woody: Affairs, love, erotism. But with a senior cast also in board (Anthony Hopkins, Gemma Jones, Roger Ashton-Griffiths, etc.), Woody also adds some cuteness and innocence to a movie that mixes spice and cream.

The stars of the cast were definately everyone as usual Allen, but specially Naomi Watts and Josh Brolin, who play a tragic couple that has been having trouble lately. Of course, Woody always treat the couple-fighting theme in a delicate way, giving us Woody Allen Fans a fresh bite of him.

The jokes and Dialogue are not Witty. Indeed, they are funny and the small gags also, but this movie is more about the situations, some tragicomic and some bittersweet, than Woody's casual fun.

The plot has left many things unconclused. Stories I wished they have been more developed, ended in a too wide place so viewers can get lost, and as everyone gets seduced by its compelling characters, there is no way people would like to know what happen to them.

Two couples find their lives turned upside down by their unfulfilled longings in this ensemble comedy from director Woody Allen. Alfie (Anthony Hopkins) and Helena (Gemma Jones) have been married for years. They have a grown-up daughter named Sally (Naomi Watts), who is married to a successful novelist named Roy (Josh Brolin), but finds the future of her marriage in jeopardy after falling for Greg (Antonio Banderas), the dapper owner of a prominent art gallery. Meanwhile, as Roy develops a fixation on Dia (Freida Pinto), an exotic beauty he encounters on the street, Alfie ditches Helena for Charmaine (Lucy Punch), an impressionable young call girl. Now it seems that the harder everyone tries runs away from their problems, the faster their lives seem to fall apart.

So, is this classic Woody, with fun and wittiness? Or new woody, Erotic and Sour? It's a mix of both, but especially of Old Woody, thanks to it's older part of the cast and Woody realizing London needed something to calm down the heat from Match Point.