Phonearl Good start, but then it gets ruined

Ketrivie It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

DubyaHan The movie is wildly uneven but lively and timely - in its own surreal way

Roxie The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

AGDeac There was a time when words could not be spoken out loud and colours were not a thing for the art of film. I speak of course about the silent era of filmmaking, back when a still young Buster Keaton released a 45 minutes long film called "Sherlock, Jr." and used the power of illusion and editing to seduce the audiences. Woody Allen, already one of the most important filmmakers of all-time, made his own "Sherlock, Jr." in 1985: The Purple Rose Of Cairo. The film is not so much of a tribute to Keaton's masterpiece as more of a tribute to the art of film itself. Woody Allen is not present on the screen this time, but we can feel his presence in the script, and in the love story, of course. The plot is simple: an everyday woman escapes everyday problems (including a not-so-caring husband played by Danny Aiello) by going to the cinema. She already watched "The Purple Rose of Cairo" for about 4 times, but that doesn't stop her from watching it the 5th time when one of the characters (Tom Baxter, played by Jeff Daniels) is so impressed by how much she likes the movie that he jumps off the screen and runs away with her out of the cinema. Things go a little crazy of course, no story that plays with reality is simple. But what Woody Allen tries to tell us is that fantasy is just as important as reality itself, and it can help us remain sane. How many times have you said that one single book, film, or even song saved your day? That's the power fantasy has on us. "The Purple Rose Of Cairo" is probably on of the most delightful films a cinephile could ever watch. It's beautifully crafted, funny, romantic and it has a lovely cast. It's not only the "Sullivan's Travells" of the 80's and Woody Allen's "Sherlock, Jr.", it represents the reason why we watch films and when you'll get to the final scene, you'll know what I mean.

mike48128 Academy and Golden Globe award winner. Excellent blending of color and black and white. Mia Farrow and Jeff Daniels are the star-crossed lovers. The only problem with their romance is that she is already married to a "do-nothing" lazy and abusive husband and Tom Baxter is fictional. He jumps off the movie screen from a typical Depression Era romantic comedy into the Real World. He isn't real. He doesn't even know how (and probably can't) make love. His money is fake and he can't start a real car. The actors left on the screen (in black and white) have absolutely nothing to do and other "Tom Baxters" are trying to walk out of the movie in other cities. So, the real actor flies to New Jersey, and tries to fix it all to save his career and the movie studio from embarrassment and ruin. He pretends to fall in love with Cecilia (Mia); it is all an act and she chooses the real actor Gill (Daniels) as poor "Tom" walks back into the movie. Gill flies back to Hollywood alone, as he only loves himself. Life goes on, and the devastated and unemployed diner waitress "Cecilia" goes back to the movie house to see Fred and Ginger dancing "Cheek-to-Cheek" in "Top Hat". Realistically filmed in a small New Jersey town, a closed amusement park, and an old-fashioned-looking diner. A fast and fascinating 82 minute movie. Done rather "straight" considering the subject matter. Mia Farrow and Jeff Daniels have great chemistry together. Also with Van Johnson and Edward Hermann. More romantic than comedy. Not your typical Woody Allen movie and perhaps better because of it.

sharky_55 Haven't we all at some point wanted to reach out and just step into a movie world? Well in The Purple Rose of the Cairo someone is granted that wish, only it is the other way around - the archaeologist character in the movie has had enough of reciting the same lines and playing the same role over and over and wants out. Allen establishes this subtly - again and again we see him addressing his adventure on screen, like he just can't believe that 24 hours ago he was still in Egypt...and there is a hint of weariness that goes along with each repetition. And then he falters one night, because someone has caught his eye...so he does the only thing that seems logical and steps off the screen.What's funny and wonderful about Purple Rose is the way it treats this little incident with an air of mild surprise and absurdity. "How is that possible???" they question, before quickly accepting it and descending back into their daily lives. Some complain for their money back. Others are intrigued and sit in the theatre for hours on end, studying the rest of the cast like some science experiment. And the executives treat it like any mini fiasco - telephoning each other in panic and hoping to shush it up while elsewhere ("The press is on our side!"), another Tom Baxter is beginning to forget his lines. The cherry on top is the self awareness in the humour (Pleasantville took a leaf out of this section) - the endearing way that Tom questions everything about real life, and how he is idealistic and innocent without any real cause. We see the signs that this relationship can't actually last, but oh, what if it could?And of course Cecilia falls hard for him, because he has been played excellently by Gil Shephard, so he is programmed to be romantic, chivalrous, poetic, charming and passionate all rolled into one. The cartoonish way he and Monk swap sides in their fight and how his nobler intentions lead him to get sucker punched. It's a far cry from her real life, after all. The vicious cycle of her waitress job, the abusive husband who flaunts his affairs in her face, and she of course cannot do what a movie character would; she makes a big show of this being the last straw and packs her things to leave him once and for all, and she is back the next day. We feel that this whole charade has been played many times. Farrow is without a doubt adorable - one of her less glamorous appearances but she brings a vulnerable, naive quality to Cecilia. She is most comfortable in the theatre and it shows - the polite usual pleasantries to the workers, her eyes lighting up in delight during the whole runtime, and the way she absent-mindedly shoves popcorn into her mouth, so engrossed that it hardly matters what she is eating. And then out of the building she is flustered and stammering, daydreaming about the last story, fan-girling when she meets an idol. Oh, so fetching. The main objective of Allen, I think, is to have us empathise with Cecilia - to have us clutching the ukulele and stare at the screen with those wide, desperate eyes, seeking solace in an imaginative world. He would later revisit this sort of longing in Midnight in Paris, but I think it works better here because it doesn't telegraph that neat, emotional ending. Cecilia doesn't have anything left except her movies, and it's like she is trying to prolong that realisation and that tragic ending. Of course in real life, the happy ending isn't always around the corner.

Ross622 In the days before watching Woody Allen's The Purple Rose of Cairo, i thought that the story was going to be an adventure movie about a man who goes to Cairo, Egypt to find a purple rose, but turns out I was sort of right. The movie tells the story of a poor waitress named Cecilia (played by Mia Farrow) who wants to escape her horrible marriage all because of her abusive husband Monk (played by Danny Aiello whose performance is very similar to both Marlon Brando in A Streetcar Named Desire, and Robert De Niro in Raging Bull), for which Cecilia watches movies to cheer herself up. One day after Cecilia is done with her waitress job she watches an adventure movie called The Purple Rose of Cairo five times in a row, and during the fifth time one of the characters Tom Baxter (played by Jeff Daniels) ends up escaping the theater screen and into the real world and at the same time ends up falling in love with Cecilia, but when that first happens the movie leaves us with one question and that is how he is going to be put back into the screen in which he escaped from along with the help of Gil Sheperd (again played by Jeff Daniels) who obviously played Baxter in the movie. One time when Woody Allen was asked on what he thought that his film was about and he said "Some critics said that The Purple Rose of Cairo was only about the movies, when I think all this movie is about is the difference between fantasy and reality." though I do agree with both critics and Allen himself. Allen blends both fantasy and reality in a way never seen before with brilliance. This movie is a true Woody Allen classic.