Everyone Says I Love You 4 out of 5 stars
Review by Ed Johnson-Ott For more reviews, go to www.nuvo-online.com and click on "film."
Late in "Everyone Says I Love You," Woody Allen and Goldie Hawn, playing a divorced couple, slip out of a benefit in Paris and go for a walk. After a bit, they sit and chat about the times they've had, about love, about relationships. They exchange a gentle, platonic kiss and then, on the banks of the river Seine, they dance. As the moonlight reflects off the water they dance gaily and, quite casually, Goldie Hawn's feet leave the ground. She slides, spins and glides ever so smoothly through the air, comfortably, as if she's done it all of her life. Hawn glows as she dances in air, so alive that even the law of gravity steps aside for a few moments. That elegant, utterly transcendent scene is one of the most wonderful things I've ever witnessed in a movie.
"Everyone Says I Love You" is Woody Allen's 26th film and his first musical. I've avoided Allen's work for some time. That business with his step-daughter was really disturbing, to be sure, but mostly I had just grown quite tired of his neurotic shtick and tedious repetition of ponderous existential questions. Things are quite different in this film, though. "Everyone Says I Love You" radiates with an effervescent innocence, with romance and hope. Creating a musical appears to have lightened Allen to the point where he uses song and dance to undermine his own bleak outlook. In one scene, Alan Alda, while seated at his father's funeral, tells the family that he never believed in God. "Even if God did exist," Alda's character quips, "He did such a terrible job that it's a wonder everyone doesn't file a giant class action suit against him." In most Woody Allen films, a line like that would be allowed to stand alone, or even worse, lead into a philosophical discussion on hopelessness. Not this time, though. Seconds after he speaks, the ghost of his father climbs right out of his coffin. While Alda and his family stare in astonishment, Grandpa starts singing "Enjoy Yourself (It's Later Than You Think)." The ghosts of other funeral home corpses join him for in a conga line, dancing and cartwheeling away any notion that death is the end.
"Everyone Says I Love You" is filled with moments like that. Even the musical form itself is treated as something quite common, as if everyone breaks into song and dance from time to time. The conceit is underlined by the way the songs are handled. Everyone sings, regardless of whether or not they have a trained voice. The combination of lush orchestration and ordinary voices has a peculiar charm. The dance numbers also have a captivating, haphazard feel. Although wonderfully choreographed, the dancers look as if they could stumble at any moment. It all adds up to musical numbers that actually feel spontaneous.
Of course, there has to be a story around all those songs, and Allen has assembled an impressive cast to tell it. He plays a writer living in quasi-exile in Paris, although he remains close friends with his painfully liberal ex-wife (Hawn) and her husband (Alda.) Numerous sub- plots spin involving everyone's kids, including a sweet romance between Drew Barrymore and Edward Norton that is interrupted when Barrymore becomes smitten with a hardened ex-con (Tim Roth.) Romance returns to Allen's life when his daughter D.J. (Natasha Lyonne) matches him up with the lovely Von (Julia Roberts). Seems D.J. has been spying on Von's counseling sessions and knows her deepest desires and fantasies. She feeds the information to Dad, who unethically uses the knowledge to become Von's dream date.
On paper, the plot seems quite complicated, but things flow very smoothly on the screen. The multiple storylines really don't matter anyway. Magic and happy endings are what the film is about. Allen uses gorgeous locations, beautiful photography and the musical numbers to create a romantic world where hope reigns supreme and love conquers all. Who would have thought the King of misery could have created so much happiness?
copyright 1997, Ed Johnson-Ott
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