Karry Best movie of this year hands down!

Laikals The greatest movie ever made..!

Helllins It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Red-Barracuda This is the Woody Allen movie which is always quite easy to overlook. The reason being is that it is the one time where he wrote and starred in a film that he did not also direct. It was based on a Broadway play that he had written and was directed by Herbert Ross. But in all honestly it feels like it could very easily be an Allen directed effort to me and if I didn't know otherwise I would never be able to guess it was anyone else at the helm quite frankly. It stands out a bit when compared to the other films he was directing at the time, all of which were pure comedies with no real focus on realistic situations or even plots but it is very similar indeed to later films such as the classic Annie Hall (1977), which combined broad comedy and physical humour with realistic relationship material that that merged comedy, drama and romance. Quite honestly, no matter who directed this one, it remains one of the best films that Allen has ever been involved in and is successfully hilarious as well as making pertinent observations about male-female relationships.The story centres on a newly divorced neurotic film critic, who has problems with forming new relationships with women. His best friends try to help him meet new ladies but it leads to a series of disastrous dates. The story is straight forward enough but the performances and writing are really what it is all about. Allen is accompanied for the first time by a couple of actors he would work with several times in Tony Roberts and Diane Keaton, who play his best friends; with Roberts so work-obsessed he neglects his wife Keaton who spends increasing amounts of time with Allen, resulting in them having a short affair. All the actors have great chemistry together, with Allen and Keaton in particular working beautifully together.Allen's script is very good with many typically memorable one-liners but it is sometimes the more physical moments that create the biggest laughs, such as the uproarious scene where he is introduced to a new date in his flat and then proceeds to make an absolute clown of himself which had me squirming with laughter. Another aspect which makes this one stand out is the way it pays homage to Casablanca (1942), which Allen's character is obsessed with. Throughout the picture he is visited by an incarnation of Humphrey Bogart, brilliantly played by Jerry Lacy, who offers hilariously unsubtle advice in how to pull women. This mixing of fantasy into a comedy-drama framework is something Allen would return to repeatedly in his later career but its arguable that he never did it so well and funny as he did here. All-in-all, this slightly overlooked movie is truly a great Woody Allen movie, irrespective of whether he was in the director's chair or not!

suite92 The Three Acts:The initial tableaux: At the very front of the film is an extended clip from the tail end of Casablanca (1942). If you are aiming to see Play It Again, Sam I would suggest seeing Casablanca first, if you have not already. That parting scene is close to the heart of neurotic movie critic Allan, who lives in San Francisco.The film soon jumps to the reality of Allan's wife leaving him. Allan's involvement with Casablanca spills over into his life as the waking hallucination of Bogart giving him advice for his many problems. No one else sees Bogart, of course.Delineation of conflicts: Allan's arguments with his ex wife are largely over, but she comes back to bite him now and then. Allan tries to re-enter the dating scene with the help of close friend Dick Christie and wife Linda Christie. These attempts run counter to Allan's lack of confidence, urge to impress by fakery, and need to make clever comments over making progress. Bogart's suggestions make sense for Bogart, but not so much for Allan.As the dating failures mount, Allan and Linda have a growing sense of attraction. Linda is married to Dick, and Dick is Allan's best friend, so how can this work?Resolution: The film comes full circle.

moonspinner55 Woody Allen adapted his own hit play and stars in this modestly amusing comedy about a recently-divorced film historian in San Francisco, cartoonishly insecure around women, who is fixed up on dates by his best friends and advised on relationship matters by the spirit of Humphrey Bogart in his "Casablanca" period. Herbert Ross directed, with Librium-slow changes in tempo (the movie pokes along from low-keyed slapstick to dazed romantic comedy). In her first film with Allen, Diane Keaton hasn't yet found her niche on-screen; her whining matches Woody's, but her overall personality is so piqued she tends to evaporate in the middle of scenes. Allen has stuffed his screenplay with one-liners and repetitive jokes that tend to run together, some making an impact and all the rest bombing out. Susan Anspach adds a slight edge as Allen's ex-wife, but Tony Roberts is a hole in the screen as the buddy who may lose his wife to Woody, a complication only Bogie could help iron out. ** from ****

classicalsteve "Play it Again, Sam" is a quote from the 1940's classic film "Casablanca" which Humphrey Bogart actually never said to Dooley Wilson who plays the piano at Rick's. (The closest is Ingrid Bergman saying "Play it, Sam", asking to play the song "As Time Goes By".) "Play it Again, Sam" is an early 1970's comedy-film, which began its life as a Broadway stage play, and is an interesting juxtaposition of Old Hollywood, pre-1960, and the new crop of leading actors of the late 1960's and 1970's who are quite different than the old tough guys of Old Hollywood. Humphrey Bogart, Clark Gable, Kirk Douglas, Charlton Heston and many others were leading men whose roles were always the dominant male resolved to make things right. In the late 1960's Woody Allen was one of many actors and writers who explored a new take on the male persona, one who was more complex but curious, emotional and even vulnerable. He could even be insecure and neurotic at times. Woody Allen, Dustin Hoffman, Ryan O'Neil, and Dudley Moore to name a few, are male actors who probably only could have landed supporting roles during the time of the Hollywood Studio before circa 1960.The story involves sex-starved recently divorced Allan Felix (Woody Allen) who is having problems getting post-marital dates. He idealizes Humphrey Bogart who appears as a kind of fantasy-apparition to give him advice about his sex life, particularly his behavior towards women. There almost can't be two more diametrically opposed male personas: Woody Allen, the neurotic, and Humphrey Bogart, the heroic American male. The film begins with Allen at a movie theatre watching the last scene of Casablanca, quite possibly the most quintessential scene of the male hero, sacrificing a love relationship for the cause of humanity. In addition to Bogey, Allan also has a fantasy persona of his ex-wife who constantly torments him about why she left him and his sexual inadequacy. Bogey and his ex-wife are like angels on his shoulder, but one tries to encourage and the other tries to discourage.To help him in the "real" world, Allan has the friendship of a married couple, Dick and Linda (Tony Roberts and Dianne Keaton), who try to set up Allan with dates. Much of the first half of the film is a series of dating misadventures in which Allen either tries too hard to "be cool" or through some mishap the date becomes a fiasco. In his first encounter with a mutual friend, he tries to make himself out as Mr. Confidence with disastrous results. His friend Dick is often engaged in numerous financial deals which allows his wife Linda to give time to Allan. She tries to console him and set him up with more dates. Inter-spliced between Linda and his dates, Allan constantly fantasizes about things aside from Bogart and his ex-wife. He dreams of ideal scenarios with women and others which turn against his goals, almost like scenes from old Hollywood films. Then as events go along, Allan finds he's falling in love with Linda, and the feelings may be mutual.This film is quintessential Woody Allen, playing the neurotic persona, desperate to the point of exasperation. He dresses funny, he tries to be "manly" which doesn't work since he isn't. He doesn't exude the aura of a Bogart or a Heston, being a film writer. He's more of an intellectual than a get-things-done type. Throughout are the little witty and sarcastic remarks which made Allen one of the most popular stand-up comedians in the 1960's. One example from many in the film is when Dick tries to liken Allan's former marriage to a business deal:Dick: Allan, you have invested your emotions in a losing stock, it was wiped out, it dropped off the board. Now what do you do Allan? You reinvest. Maybe in a more stable stock. Something with long term growth possibilities. Allan: Who are you going to fix me up with, General Motors? If there is a message to the story, which I think there is, it is that we need to be ourselves and let someone find us who simply likes us as we are. Too often, we try to be something else to impress the opposite sex, and that's never going to work even among the most idealistic of circumstances.