Play It Again, Sam

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Linda G @Goldy78 Oct 30 Woody Allen and Diane Keaton at their best. See more Dan F @Dan_Frazier Oct 18 Sometimes funny. More often awkward or anxiety producing. I don't feel the story is very satisfying, though there is more of a story than with some of Allen's other films. What the film does best is capture some of the insecurity many people feel about starting new relationships. It also captures something of the time period in which it was filmed, a time before cell phones and dating apps. See more Stephen C @bob25009 Oct 15 Funny in 1 hour and 27 minutes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! See more alan g @agenser 07/28/2025 OK if you like Casablnca. BTW Bogart never said that. He simply said at the end of his speech, "play it." See more Bradley S @RT52236733 03/05/2025 His best true comedy particularly if you like Casablanca and relate to the awkwardness of being in relationships. See more Matthew B @RT07450941 09/03/2023 Play It Again, Sam may not have the depth of later Woody Allen films, but it was an important transition from earlier light-hearted Allen comedies to the more serious works that were to follow. Allen began with movies such as Take the Money and Run, Bananas, Sleeper, and Love and Death, which were essentially a series of comic set-pieces, tied together by a loose storyline. From this, he was to move on to romantic comedies in which there was a stronger plot and deeper characterisation, such as Annie Hall and Manhattan. Play It Again, Sam was made before Sleeper, and Love and Death, but it anticipated what would come later. It is essentially a comedy with no very serious pretentions, but with a well-developed narrative that tells a story with a clear beginning, middle and end. The title of the film is derived from a misquotation of a famous line in Casablanca. At the start of the movie, a rapt Allan Felix (Allen) is watching the end of Casablanca, the images from the screen reflecting off his glasses; by the end of the movie, he is living out the same scene. It is Bogart that Allan particularly admires. There are posters of the iconic actor on all the walls of Allan's flat. To say that Allan's life is influenced by Bogie is an understatement. In fact a manifestation of the deceased actor (played by Jerry Lacy) appears in Allan's room and offers him advice about his love life. Admittedly Bogart is perhaps not the right kind of person to coach someone like Allan. As Bogart tells him, "I never saw a dame yet that didn't understand a good slap in the mouth or a slug from a 45". Allan is a man who is more comfortable watching old movies than dating girls. He would rather take a date to an Erich von Stroheim film festival than to a club. He knows the dialogue from the key scenes in Casablanca off by heart, but he can never be like his hero. Woody Allen's film is redolent with nostalgia about the past. Wouldn't we all sometimes like to have a guardian angel who steps in to offer us advice? And who better than one of our heroes? However Allen is wise enough to recognise that an idealised version of the past can provide no serious help in understanding the inadequacies of human beings in the present. Bogart can take Allan only so far, as this is a different world. Woody Allen adopts a style that would become more familiar in Annie Hall a few years later. His hero soliloquises or has conversations with Bogart. The story contains flashbacks and comical fantasies, including scenarios where Dick tells Allan that he is running off with an Inuit, decides to drown himself, or attempts to murder Allan Italian-style. There are not as many comic set-pieces as in Allen's other early movies, and the dramatic content is not as profound as in Allen's later films, but Play It Again, Sam is still a very funny work that created the space to allow Allen to move from comedian to serious film-maker. I wrote a longer appreciation of Play It Again, Sam on my blog page if you would like to read more: https://themoviescreenscene.wordpress.com/2022/02/16/play-it-again-sam-1972/ See more Read all reviews

Play It Again, Sam

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