Match Point
Writer - Woody Allen
Director - Woody Allen
Stars - Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Scarlett Johansson
A great deal of attention has been given to Woody Allen lately for spurning his life-long lover, New York, and deciding to film in London instead. Match Point is the first product of this tryst but it feels like little more than a drunken kiss under the mistletoe that went slightly too far rather than the passionate love affair Allen has supposedly embarked upon with the other side of the Atlantic.
Not only has he left his trademark New York, but Allen the writer has forsaken Woody the character. It is customary to see the neurotic fellow pop up in any given Allen film, transplanted from Annie Hall, even by proxy as was the case with Jason Biggs in Anything Else. Instead, the film is centred around Rhys-Meyers, who is effectively playing Mr Ripley's less talented brother. He comes from a working class Irish background and, after making a name for himself on the professional tennis circuit, has recently settled in London to coach at an exclusive club. His chief concerns appear to be financial and social status, yet he soon befriends Matthew Goode's executive character and is inducted into the Hewett clan. Before pausing to take breath he is employed by Goode's father, the always welcome Brian Cox, charming the mother, Penelope Wilton, and engaged to the sister, Emily Mortimer, despite clearly having feelings for Johansson; a struggling actress engaged to Goode.
So far so good, yet Rhys-Meyers proves to be rather incapable of carrying the emotional weight of the film. He can handle the business scenes very well, strutting around in a tailor-made suit to network with prospective clients, yet there are no layers to his performance. We are told many times that Johansson is his passion but we cannot see it in his eyes. His character experiences weddings, births and deaths in the film but greets them all in the same detached manner. This is something of a problem considering the choices his character makes as the love triangle tightens a noose round his neck, since his rather far-fetched actions do not feel convincing in the least. Only in a single scene towards the end, when he encounters a couple of detectives played by James Nesbitt and Ewan Bremner, does he begin to show a suitable range.
Perhaps even more damaging is that Allen's usual flair for dialogue has escaped him this time around. Only Nesbitt and Bremner seem capable of breathing life into the script with their brief scenes in order to present genuinely charming characters. Mostly the film just plods along through multiple scenes in fashionable eateries and upper-class culture traps, killing time in an increasingly vacuous way. It only seems to want to explore its themes by posing the questions a) isn't London pretty?, and b) isn't Scarlett Johansson pretty? The majority of the audience will answer affirmatively to at least one of those questions but probably without mustering much enthusiasm.
Allen seems to want to make some point about luck; the strength of the influence that it has on our lives and how insecure we feel because of it. This is best summed up in the opening shot, with a tennis ball hitting the top of the net and pausing in mid-air. Does it go forwards, so you win, or backwards, so you don't? Sadly, that is the most insightful the film gets since all explorations of luck are put on hold until a facsimilie of the same shot occurs in the third act to determine Rhys-Meyers' fate. It is probably rather difficult to base a script around luck since it often just feels like a cop-out to the audience, as it does here. It feels more like Allen simply tacked on that opening shot as a pre-emptive apology for what occurs later.
Later still, there will be another Allen movie set in London starring Johansson. Perhaps by then he will be comfortable enough to provide examples of the refreshment this trans-Atlantic fling is said to have given him.
Rating - 4
Director - Woody Allen
Stars - Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Scarlett Johansson
A great deal of attention has been given to Woody Allen lately for spurning his life-long lover, New York, and deciding to film in London instead. Match Point is the first product of this tryst but it feels like little more than a drunken kiss under the mistletoe that went slightly too far rather than the passionate love affair Allen has supposedly embarked upon with the other side of the Atlantic.
Not only has he left his trademark New York, but Allen the writer has forsaken Woody the character. It is customary to see the neurotic fellow pop up in any given Allen film, transplanted from Annie Hall, even by proxy as was the case with Jason Biggs in Anything Else. Instead, the film is centred around Rhys-Meyers, who is effectively playing Mr Ripley's less talented brother. He comes from a working class Irish background and, after making a name for himself on the professional tennis circuit, has recently settled in London to coach at an exclusive club. His chief concerns appear to be financial and social status, yet he soon befriends Matthew Goode's executive character and is inducted into the Hewett clan. Before pausing to take breath he is employed by Goode's father, the always welcome Brian Cox, charming the mother, Penelope Wilton, and engaged to the sister, Emily Mortimer, despite clearly having feelings for Johansson; a struggling actress engaged to Goode.
So far so good, yet Rhys-Meyers proves to be rather incapable of carrying the emotional weight of the film. He can handle the business scenes very well, strutting around in a tailor-made suit to network with prospective clients, yet there are no layers to his performance. We are told many times that Johansson is his passion but we cannot see it in his eyes. His character experiences weddings, births and deaths in the film but greets them all in the same detached manner. This is something of a problem considering the choices his character makes as the love triangle tightens a noose round his neck, since his rather far-fetched actions do not feel convincing in the least. Only in a single scene towards the end, when he encounters a couple of detectives played by James Nesbitt and Ewan Bremner, does he begin to show a suitable range.
Perhaps even more damaging is that Allen's usual flair for dialogue has escaped him this time around. Only Nesbitt and Bremner seem capable of breathing life into the script with their brief scenes in order to present genuinely charming characters. Mostly the film just plods along through multiple scenes in fashionable eateries and upper-class culture traps, killing time in an increasingly vacuous way. It only seems to want to explore its themes by posing the questions a) isn't London pretty?, and b) isn't Scarlett Johansson pretty? The majority of the audience will answer affirmatively to at least one of those questions but probably without mustering much enthusiasm.
Allen seems to want to make some point about luck; the strength of the influence that it has on our lives and how insecure we feel because of it. This is best summed up in the opening shot, with a tennis ball hitting the top of the net and pausing in mid-air. Does it go forwards, so you win, or backwards, so you don't? Sadly, that is the most insightful the film gets since all explorations of luck are put on hold until a facsimilie of the same shot occurs in the third act to determine Rhys-Meyers' fate. It is probably rather difficult to base a script around luck since it often just feels like a cop-out to the audience, as it does here. It feels more like Allen simply tacked on that opening shot as a pre-emptive apology for what occurs later.
Later still, there will be another Allen movie set in London starring Johansson. Perhaps by then he will be comfortable enough to provide examples of the refreshment this trans-Atlantic fling is said to have given him.
Rating - 4
posted by Thed at 17:51
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