Woody Allen’s ‘Tall Dark Stranger’ is too content with mediocrity

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, the latest film from the prolific writer/director Woody Allen, is a pleasant movie about the difficulties of love at all ages. Like typical films from this iconic auteur, the plot surrounds a web of relationships involving mothers, fathers, girlfriends, boyfriends and secret lovers. It could be classified as another entry in Allen’s growing late period, a time in his professional life when the cities of Europe have far more fascinated him than his old haunts in New York City.

Though Tall Dark Stranger is based in London, this is no Match Point, his 2005 gem about class differences starring Scarlett Johansson and Jonathan Rhys Meyers. For even though Tall Dark Stranger leaves a smile on one’s face, it’s not terribly deep, and its 98 minutes fly by a little too effortlessly.

Naomi Watts plays Sally Channing, an aspiring art dealer who is having trouble with her medical-student-turned-novelist husband, Roy (an unfortunately miscast Josh Brolin). They live in London and are frequently visited by Sally’s mother, Helena (Gemma Jones), and father, Alfie (Anthony Hopkins). I don’t think it’s a fluke that Hopkins’ character is named after one of movie history’s most famous bachelors (the original Alfie starred Michael Caine; the remake starred Jude Law).

What sets the convoluted plot in motion is when Helena and Alfie break up after 40 years of marriage. Helena is heartbroken and seeks the advice of a psychic, while Alfie goes through a late-in-life mid-life crisis and finds love with a prostitute named Charmaine (Lucy Punch), or Chow Mein as Alfie’s daughter begins to call her.

With her parents’ marriage in shambles, Sally is increasingly agitated at Roy for never finishing his novel, and when he finally completes the book, and it’s rejected by a publisher, the reality of their existences begins to come into focus. Throw into the equation Antonio Banderas playing Sally’s new art-dealing boss, and you’ve got an Allen film ripe for discussion. Unlike his other tangled love stories, like Manhattan or Match Point, You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger is content with keeping the mood light-hearted and pleasant. It stays in shallow waters.

There is an annoying and unnecessary voiceover that doesn’t propel the plot. The score has that wispy, a day-in-the-park feel. There doesn’t seem to be a care in the world, even when these broken characters are hurting the most. When Helena cries over her failed marriage, one can’t throw comfort her way because she’s never taken seriously. Perhaps if the movie came closer to the dramatic/comedic line, Helena’s spiral into the world of the occult would be far more interesting, but in Tall Dark Stranger it seems like a convenient plot device.

There is also a side story involving Roy and his new novel, and again, it never fully achieves what it sets out to accomplish. It’s simply there as another petal in this cinematic flower.

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger is not difficult to sit through. Although it’s light fare, it’s also handled as well as can be. The performances are nicely structured, especially Jones as Helena. Oddly, I thought Hopkins achieved the best presence on the screen, for it was Alfie’s story that truly felt tragic in some dark way. There are also many great one-liners of dialogue from Allen, the man who has written so much about love and relationships through the years.

This isn’t a bad movie, but it’s too content being a good one.

By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com

• You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
  

• 2010

• Written and directed by Woody Allen
  

• Starring Naomi Watts, Gemma Jones, Lucy Punch, Josh Brolin, Antonio Banderas and Anthony Hopkins
  

• Running time: 98 minutes

• Rated R for some language

• Rating:

Revised