***½/**** Image A Sound C+
starring Woody Allen, Blythe Danner, Judy Davis, Mia Farrow
written and directed by Woody Allen
by Bill Chambers Woody Allen movies of late are eager to indict the creepy misanthrope who's been a staple of the writer-director-actor's oeuvre at least since Allen stepped into the shoes of Annie Hall's Alvy Singer. But in the final analysis, Allen has continued to pardon his alter egos, deflecting blame for their shortcomings by casting a negative light on everybody they know, too. If Sweet and Lowdown, the movie Deconstructing Harry wasn't ready to be, is any indication, the Woodman's work is, at last, becoming more nakedly confessional.
The casting of Sean Penn as antiheroic, Depression-era musician Emmet Ray is inspired: the actor is too vital to merely parrot his director, as so often happens when Allen defers the lead role to a star. (The low point has to be Kenneth Branagh Rich Little-ing him in Celebrity.) Ray is considered the second greatest jazz guitarist in the world after his idol, Django Reinhardt, whose presence is his kryptonite–the only thing capable of humbling him. It is never expected of artists to demur, but Emmet can't or otherwise won't shut up about his own formidable talent.
It's the movie's inspired gambit to pair this needy artist who subsists on a diet of steady praise with Hattie (Samantha Morton), a mute laundrette. How can this work? The answer is that her inability to compliment him means she can't criticize him, either. Nevertheless, Emmet becomes verbally abusive towards her, always and unforgivably excusing this behaviour as part and parcel of the artist's temperament. (Is there a reason Penn is so convincing in the role?) When he finally leaves her, it's because he realizes he's falling in love with her–someone other than himself. Later, he impetuously marries Blanche (Uma Thurman), an aspiring biographer about whom he couldn't care less, except when her infidelity challenges his pride. The routine of many men, unfortunately.
Penn, who has purportedly boycotted the Golden Globes for life because they didn't nominate Hurlyburly, is the very embodiment of a celebrity capable of talking the talk and walking the walk. The role of Emmet skews to his greatest strengths, calling for ferocious energy and comic dissonance. Yet the character, a funnier, more flamboyantly garbed Jake LaMotta, is not necessarily a creation we expect from Allen. For once, the hyphenate allows his protagonist to see his pathology through to its logical, thoroughly alienating end, giving the picture a unique integrity. Maybe it helps that Allen is aping Fellini here instead of Bergman (or himself). That didn't go well last time (Shadows and Fog), but Sweet and Lowdown is less a parody of a style than it is a riff on Fellini's La Strada.
The vulnerable-looking Morton is likewise brilliant in a wordless performance. Of course, her Hattie does have the dubious distinction of characterizing the perfect woman as silent and subservient. (Her Oscar loss may have been in protest of such a humiliating notion.) I also have to question Sweet and Lowdown's pseudo-documentary approach: jazz aficionados, including Allen, relate urban legends pertaining to the fictional Emmet in what plays like a flimsy excuse to sometimes pad a skinny narrative with two or three versions of the same scene when their stories prove contradictory. It occurs to me that through all these variations, the message, which Allen himself gives voice to towards the end of the picture, remains the same: misery makes great music. The nice thing about Sweet and Lowdown is that it presents this as a sad, ironic conundrum rather than an apology.
THE DVD
Sweet and Lowdown, the most beautifully photographed Allen film in many a year (the celebrated Fei Zhao was the cinematographer), makes a seamless transition to DVD. The 16×9-enhanced, 1.85:1 letterboxed image is near-flawless. (Penn and Thurman's wardrobes–they are described in the film as "two peacocks"–must have been a compression nightmare.) An unmatted version resides on the platter's flipside; behold, the most handsome Columbia TriStar disc I've seen in quite some time. Audio is surprisingly detailed 2-channel Dolby mono. Penn's guitar playing, often imperceptibly dubbed by Howard Alden, never sounds crushed by the more limited dynamic range. For your 5.1 fix, visit the trailer gallery, where you'll find Dolby Digital previews for Gattaca, Les Miserables, and U-Turn (in varying degrees of widescreen), as well as mono, full-frame trailers for Allen's Husbands and Wives (not yet available on DVD), Manhattan Murder Mystery, and Sweet and Lowdown itself.
95 minutes; R; 1.85:1 (16×9-enhanced), 1.33:1; English DD 2.0 (Mono), French DD 2.0 (Mono); CC; English, Spanish subtitles; DVD-10; Region One; Columbia TriStar
