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Archive for February 3, 2006

Match Point (2005)

February 3, 2006 at 8:36 pm · Filed under Movies

Match PointWhat does it take for me to like Theodore Dreiser, born exactly 100 years before me and similarly full of frustratingly unfulfilled potential? Apparently, it takes Woody Allen to film An American Tragedy filtered through the triplequadruple-action lenscharcoal of Chekhov, George Stevens, Patricia Highsmith and Dostoevsky. And yeah, there’s probably some Bergman in there too, this being one of Allen’s more seriouser endeavors.

There’s also a lot of Crimes and Misdemeanors involved, which I like and recently resaw. Crimes is regarded as Allen’s masterwork by people who aren’t me (how can you top Annie Hall?). But I feel like this movie has just as much to say about transgression as C&M, with very little of the to-my-ears repetitive and fluffy rumination. It also takes a different tack to the problem of sin in an amoral world. The power that be is not God or legally-blind rabbi Sam Waterston’s nebulous higher power — is God nebulous because he’s blurry? — but dumb luck.

I wouldn’t say I’m a fan of Jonathan Rhys-Meyers’ one-note, callow fancy-lad characters in movies like Velvet Goldmine, The Governess, and Titus (and did you know he just played Elvis on TV?!?), but he’s got an edge and a depth to him — a depthy edge — here that really works. I cannot speak to his work in Bend It Like Beckham but I believe Jessica disliked MP primarily because of the BILB connection.

Jessica hates BILB. Someone is going to have to unbend it, and I’m afraid it might be me.

Scarlett Johansson’s role is a little different for her as a down-on-her-luck actress who temporarily makes good. It was a little hard to buy her character change toward the end of the film, but I appreciated the depthy edge she was trying for.

Did you ever think you’d live to see Woody Allen embracing CGI? By my count, this makes the third movie of his (following Everyone Says I Love You and Deconstructing Harry) that features critical scenes augmented with computer graphics. It kind of makes you wonder what Zelig would be like if he made it today.

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