Melinda and Melinda review
Issue #23
Directed by Woody Allen
By Rebecca Flint-Marx
Published: March 1st, 2005 | 11:59am
Calling Melinda and Melinda Woody Allen’s best work of the century is not as grand a compliment as it sounds: How much competition can there be amid the likes of The Curse of the Jade Scorpion and Hollywood Ending? Still, Allen’s latest is a return to form by any measure — it’s spirited, heartfelt, and buoyed as much by what happens in front of the camera as Allen’s decision to remain behind it.
Instead of pairing himself with an actress born after his 40th birthday, the 69-year-old writer-director has cast Radha Mitchell in the film’s dual title roles. A criminally underrated Australian actress still best-known to American audiences as Ally Sheedy’s lover in High Art, Mitchell stars in dueling narratives — one tragic, one comedic — spun by a pair of New York playwrights from an anecdote about a woman who shows up unannounced at a dinner party.
The tragedy sees Melinda as a lost soul whose reintroduction into the privileged Manhattan world of her youth offers brief happiness (in the form of a sexy pianist played by Dirty Pretty Things Chiwetel Ejiofor before an inevitable downfall. In the comedy, Melinda is a light-hearted character whose rapport with the bumbling husband (Will Ferrell) of her upstairs neighbor, a high-strung filmmaker (Amanda Peet) provides the narrative — and the entire movie — with sweet soul.
Though Melinda showcases Mitchell’s talents, it also gives plenty of attention to those of her co-stars, particularly Ejiofor and Ferrell, the latter of whom, as Allen’s surrogate, puts his often overwhelming energy to good use as a simple, nice guy worthy of Mitchell’s affections. That said, Melinda and Melinda is not without its problems: the tragedy lacks the depth and weight of a real tragedy; Chloë Sevigny, as a Park Avenue princess, gives a stiff encore performance of her turn in The Last Days of Disco; and Allen’s entitled white Manhattanites have long been mired in a genteel pigsty of caricature. But while Melinda and Melinda is no Annie Hall or Crimes and Misdemeanors, it’s a relief to see Allen at the helm of a film that is a deserving heir to these past glories.
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