Books about Woody Allen

[Fletch F. Fletch]

Could someone recommend some good books on Woody's movies? I've checked out Woody Allen on Woody Allen and that looks to be a good starting point. Any others?

[jorencain]

That's a great one to start with, and probably the best one I've read. I would definitely NOT recommend John Baxter's "Woody Allen: A Biography." I found it to be very sensationalist and focused on the whole Soon Yi/Mia Farrow drama. I remember hearing that Eric Lax's book is good, but I haven't read it.

[godardslave]

i have read the eric lax book, its good.

[devlinnn]

For the 'early, funny films', Loser Take All - The Comic Art of Woody Allen by Maurice Yacowar is very good. Woody's first editor Ralph Rosenblum's own story When the Shooting Stops...The Cutting Begins is a very good read also, as it gives an interesting take on the development of Woody Allen: Filmmaker. As does Woody Allen on Location by Thierry de Navacelle, who was allowed on-set access during the filming of Radio Days. Close to the finest book of its kind I've read.

But for a critical study on the films, Peter J. Bailey's The Reluctant Film Art of Woody Allen is the real deal. Intelligent, passionate, serious and critcal, it allows one to go back to the films with fresh insight - all that one can ask for in film studies.

[Fletch F. Fletch]

That's a great one to start with, and probably the best one I've read. I would definitely NOT recommend John Baxter's "Woody Allen: A Biography." I found it to be very sensationalist and focused on the whole Soon Yi/Mia Farrow drama. I remember hearing that Eric Lax's book is good, but I haven't read it.

For the 'early, funny films', Loser Take All - The Comic Art of Woody Allen by Maurice Yacowar is very good. Woody's first editor Ralph Rosenblum's own story When the Shooting Stops...The Cutting Begins is a very good read also, as it gives an interesting take on the development of Woody Allen: Filmmaker. As does Woody Allen on Location by Thierry de Navacelle, who was allowed on-set access during the filming of Radio Days. Close to the finest book of its kind I've read.

But for a critical study on the films, Peter J. Bailey's The Reluctant Film Art of Woody Allen is the real deal. Intelligent, passionate, serious and critcal, it allows one to go back to the films with fresh insight - all that one can ask for in film studies.

Thanks for all of these suggestions everybody! This gives me a lot to check out. I will track some of these books down.

[AWA]

Just to update this thread - the absolute best book on Woody as a filmmaker is the recently released "Conversations With Woody Allen" by his longtime biographer Eric Lax. Essential reading for the most detailed insights from the man himself to every aspect of his filmmaking (from the idea itself to editing to his career) in interviews that span over 36 years. Nothing even comes close. Essential reading even if you're not a big Woody fan but are an aspiring filmmaker.

[broadwayrock]

Just to update this thread - the absolute best book on Woody as a filmmaker is the recently released "Conversations With Woody Allen" by his longtime biographer Eric Lax. Essential reading for the most detailed insights from the man himself to every aspect of his filmmaking (from the idea itself to editing to his career) in interviews that span over 36 years. Nothing even comes close. Essential reading even if you're not a big Woody fan but are an aspiring filmmaker.

How does it compare to Allen On Allen?

[Highway 61]

Lax's book consists of about four or five major interviews, focused heavily on the films Allen was making at the time. For instance, there is a wealth of material on Sleeper and Another Woman, which Lax was around to see Allen shooting and editing. Whereas Bjorkman's Allen on Allen is a series of interviews covering his entire career that is great at introducing Allen's style and explaining his more esoteric films, and it also introduces you to Allen's "I'm not a real artist, and I wish I didn't have to die" personality, which is unlike virtually every other filmmaker's mentality. But if you're already familiar with Allen's work and personality, the Lax book is far more satisfying. Conversations also features a list of Allen's 15 favorite films, for what it's worth.

[broadwayrock]

The Lax book sounds right up my street.

Thanks Highway 61!

[Dylan]

Lax's book consists of about four or five major interviews, focused heavily on the films Allen was making at the time. For instance, there is a wealth of material on Sleeper and Another Woman, which Lax was around to see Allen shooting and editing. Whereas Bjorkman's Allen on Allen is a series of interviews covering his entire career that is great at introducing Allen's style and explaining his more esoteric films, and it also introduces you to Allen's "I'm not a real artist, and I wish I didn't have to die" personality, which is unlike virtually every other filmmaker's mentality. But if you're already familiar with Allen's work and personality, the Lax book is far more satisfying. Conversations also features a list of Allen's 15 favorite films, for what it's worth.

Ironically, I just finished Lax's new Allen book this morning (read the first 3/4 last night before bed, finished the last 1/4 on the bus - I'm a pretty fast reader), and it's magnificent, though for me it's more the perfect companion piece to the 2001 edition of Lax's Allen biography than a superior volume.

Part of what's exciting about Conversations is how incredibly up to date it is, going right up to Cassandra's Dream, but it also gives Allen the rare opportunity to discuss many films of his that haven't received sufficient coverage in other books (like Alice, Celebrity, Anything Else, Melinda and Melinda), and it also gives Allen the opportunity to vividly express his feelings about cinematography (lots and lots of juicy information about working with Gordon Willis, Carlo Di Palma and Sven Nykvist), scoring and casting, among many other topics. Moreso than the other books, it also demonstrates Allen constant (endless!) self-deprecation. He may be the single-most exceedingly humble great artist I know of (refreshing indeed in a field filled with egomaniacs, including some of my own favorite filmmakers of course). I found it tremendously inspiring, and I just love Allen's personality, style and work ethic. I don't believe there's another filmmaker in cinema's history who's nearly as consistently impressive as Allen, though that's my opinion and not one a great many others share (here or elsewhere).

For fun, here is Allen's list of the greatest films ever made (in no order):

The Seventh Seal
Rashomon
The Bicycle Thief
Grand Illusion
Rules of the Game
Wild Strawberries
8 1/2
Amarcord
Throne of Blood
Cries and Whispers
La Strada
The 400 Blows
Breathless
Seven Samurai
Shoeshine
Citizen Kane

And there are mounds and mounds of trivia and facts, a few I found interesting:

-a fair amount of Anything Else (for me one of his ten best) derived from his first (unpublished) novel.
-the first cut of Scoop was 134 minutes, and included a lot of exposition. Another edit was 100 minutes, the final cut was 91.
-the Paris project with Michelle Williams went $5+ million overbudget, and a lot of that was apparently attributed to music. He says he still wants to do it, if he can get the additional funding. It doesn't seem to me like it would be that hard for him to get the additional funding, but I'm not entirely sure what the circumstances were.
-one idea for Cassandra's Dream's music was to have it all be Miles Davis, but apparently the money it would've cost to use Davis was insane. Philip Glass was suggested by one of the people on production.

And this is just a taste. There's also some great information Allen divulges about screenplays he's written that he hasn't filmed yet, and much more. Also, for fans of Another Woman (one of my favorites, and a particularly gorgeous-looking late eighties Allen) much of this is a great account on its making and editing.

This is a must even for the casual Allen fan, hardcore fans should read both this and Lax's biography.

[domino harvey]

Sounds really excellent, especially since I have a keen interest in his late-period films.
And only two of his fifteen favorite films aren't released by Criterion!

[AWA]

Btw - I should also note that I was fortunate enough to conduct a one hour interview with author Eric Lax about the book and Woody a couple of months ago for a radio program, which due to a variety of reasons, is still in editing and has not yet aired. But I did get some more insights into the making of the book and Woody himself. Eric is as nice a person as they come.

While it is true that Woody's self-deprication routine shows up here, Lax, through interviewing him for close to four decades, does occasionally get Woody to slip up on things he otherwise trots out about himself - for instance, Woody claims to "not see a frame" of a film once it is finished but does admit that if one of his films comes on television while he's doing his one hour tredmill exercise he will watch it (specifically in the book he mentions watching "Alice" and "Anything Else" that way and makes a vague reference to seeing "Broadway Danny Rose" the same way). Which is not something you would ever get to hear out of Woody anywhere else.

Also - this book, for Woody fans, is like the Criterion Collection for all his films in paper form. Background information on all films and in-depth analysis on the process of them (especially, as mentioned before, "Another Woman" and "Sleeper")... better still, those comments come *at the time* of the making of those films, so there is plenty of context here. You get insight into unreleased outtakes, alternate versions, alternate casting, etc etc etc that Woody has always withheld - from the little things (like a list of names they wrote out trying to think up a title for "Crimes & Misdemeanors" - one of which was "Anything Else") to bigger things like the re-filming of "September". Plus - this is the only place where you get to hear Woody talk about ideas he's yet to film (specifically his dream film project, "American Blues" - which I asked Woody about, to his surprise, when I met him in person last December) .

As far as "Woody on Woody" goes from Bjorkman, I had read that before hand and Conversations is vaslty superior. Woody is obviously far, far more open with Lax than he is with Bjorkman and the book reads much better when broken up into topics of the stages of filmmaking rather than catagorized into individual films in chronological order (which stiffled the Bjorkman conversations at times). Plus the Bjorkman book's latest update (going up to Hollywood Ending) is not worth it as Woody gives very short, pert answers and does not seem interested in Bjorkman's book at all. This book Woody is obviously extremely engaged in.

Though if I have one complaint, which I did bring up with Lax, is that Lax let him get away with one of Woody's biggest self-depreciating routines, like most interviewers do - the one where Woody claims to have not had any influence on anyone in modern film. Surely someone, somewhere, has half the mind to bring up some examples (like Charlie Kaufman or Wes Anderson) which prove otherwise and ask Woody what he thinks of something like "Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind" (I'd wager quite a bit that he's seen it).

But that's a minor, minor complaint compared to the immense volume of knowledge and insight this book offers on Woody's process and work ethic. As I said before, even if you're a marginal Woody fan but are an aspiring filmmaker, you need to read this book. It is the best textbook out there without ever reading like one.

a fair amount of Anything Else (for me one of his ten best) derived from his first (unpublished) novel.

Hard to believe - while I like that film, I consider it to be amongst his 5 worst films. Biggs and Ricci are completely incapable of handling a Woody script and the only time that film has any traction is when Woody himself is on the screen.

But - that aside - I should point out, if you don't know already, a great piece is written about it by cinematographer Darius Khondji in the book "New Cinematographers" with 3 photos from the set of him working with Woody. All kinds of insight into how things worked on set with Woody, technical film stock and camera information, etc etc etc. What the book doesn't say though is the reason why Khondji was brought in at the last possible minute ... because long time Woody DP Carlo DiPalma was going to come out of retirement to shoot that one with Woody, having gone as far as scouting locations. Carlo failed a physical though and was not allowed to do it - and, sadly, died less than a year later. So pre-production was nearing completion and they had to find a new cinematographer. Thankfully Khondji was able to talk them into doing it in 2.35:1, the only other film by Woody other than "Manhattan" to be done in that format.

[Highway 61]

Sounds really excellent, especially since I have a keen interest in his late-period films.
And only two of his fifteen favorite films aren't released by Criterion!

I must be remembering wrong because I could swear Allen's list was more interesting than your average Criterion worshiper. I distinctly recall Allen praising Lumet's The Hill and listing it among the greatest films ever made, but maybe that was in a different interview...

Another fantastic Woody book is The Illustrated Woody Allen Reader. It's short and sweet, but something of a coffee table book packed with photos that accompany excerpts from screenplays, New Yorker pieces, stand-up routines, interviews, etc. I stumbled across a used copy recently and couldn't believe I'd never seen it before. Highly recommended for the serious Allen fan.

[Dylan]

I must be remembering wrong because I could swear Allen's list was more interesting than your average Criterion worshiper. I distinctly recall Allen praising Lumet's The Hill and listing it among the greatest films ever made, but maybe that was in a different interview...

Well, here's the thing: Allen listed his favorite American films, then his favorite foreign films, then he said "if you take Citizen Kane off the American films list and put it at the end of the foreign list, you'll have my picks for the greatest films of all-time."

Here's his full American films list:

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Double Indemnity
Shane
Paths of Glory
The Godfather: Part II
Goodfellas
Citizen Kane
White Heat
The Hill
The Informer
The Third Man
Notorious
Shadow of a Doubt
A Streetcar Named Desire
The Maltese Falcon

I commend his taste.

Btw - I should also note that I was fortunate enough to conduct a one hour interview with author Eric Lax about the book and Woody a couple of months ago for a radio program, which due to a variety of reasons, is still in editing and has not yet aired. But I did get some more insights into the making of the book and Woody himself. Eric is as nice a person as they come.

I look very forward to it. Definitely let us know when it's posted.

Also - this book, for Woody fans, is like the Criterion Collection for all his films in paper form.

A perfect summation. It's certainly a treasure, and the most personal glimpse of Allen we've been allowed since Wild Man Blues.

Hard to believe - while I like that film, I consider it to be amongst his 5 worst films. Biggs and Ricci are completely incapable of handling a Woody script and the only time that film has any traction is when Woody himself is on the screen.

For me it's a gorgeous, intelligent and warm film. It also rings more and more true with me everytime I revisit it (have seen it maybe five times). I honestly walked out of the theatre in 2003 believing this would start a huge revival of Allen among the youth of today, and I was incredibly surprised at its poor reception. I think it's one of the greatest films ever made about people in their twenties, and one of Allen's finest pictures.

But - that aside - I should point out, if you don't know already, a great piece is written about it by cinematographer Darius Khondji in the book "New Cinematographers" with 3 photos from the set of him working with Woody. All kinds of insight into how things worked on set with Woody, technical film stock and camera information, etc etc etc. What the book doesn't say though is the reason why Khondji was brought in at the last possible minute ... because long time Woody DP Carlo DiPalma was going to come out of retirement to shoot that one with Woody, having gone as far as scouting locations. Carlo failed a physical though and was not allowed to do it - and, sadly, died less than a year later. So pre-production was nearing completion and they had to find a new cinematographer. Thankfully Khondji was able to talk them into doing it in 2.35:1, the only other film by Woody other than "Manhattan" to be done in that format.

Great, thanks. Darius Khondji's work here is my favorite post-Nykvist cinematography in an Allen film, and I'd love some more insight on its making.

[Highway 61]

Ah yes, I remember now. Thanks Dylan!

It's interesting that so many of his choices are not romantic comedies or easily-labeled relationship movies. So many of them are suspense pieces, I wonder if part of Allen's negativity towards his own work stems from a desire to tell mysteries, but ending up with a comedy or straight-up drama instead? Essentially like starting with a murder mystery and finishing with Annie Hall.

[domino harvey]

I thought Allen loved L'avventura, maybe he just forgot to mention it the day he was interviewed. You guys have got me all excited about these books!

[AWA]

He does cite Antonioni as his influence in his first foray into making something resembling a "serious" film - the Italian segment in Everything You've Always....

Dylan - I'm assuming you post at IMDB as well. I think we're having this discussion twice about Anything Else. Either that, or you have a secret double who is quoting you nearly verbatim regarding this film.

Anything Else's reception had everything to do with the way they marketed it, targetting the American Pie audience. Biggs and Ricci, sorry - they can't talk a Woody script. They don't sound like they know anyone that talks like that. And Woody injects the film with some more meaningful content in the form of his character's many rants, but, when compared to how he conveyed similar ideas before in previous films, he didn't just set up a scenario where one character sat and listened to another character rant about a variety of loosely related subjects and toss off various leftover one-liners. Obviously, I'm as big a Woody fan as anyone, but it isn't fit to lift those weights.

And while I'm inclined to agree about Khondji's work on this film, there are many mistakes throughout the film that prevent it from being great, or at least as good as it could have been.

Having re-watched "Another Woman" and "September" this past weekend, it reminded me that Woody's biggest problem of late is not writing for characters his own age, which was his bread and butter from the beginning of his career right up until Jade Scorpion. While I'm not one of those buffoon critics who want to suggest there are no twenty-somethings that discuss Bogart and listen to Billie Holiday (obviously, because me and my friends would certainly more than fit the bill) - certainly not that, but it does come across that Woody himself is unaware these types of young people do still exist ... and worse still, Biggs and Ricci also seem unaware two attractive young twentysomethings would be shopping for jazz vinyl. I think it's an example of why you should always stick to the adage of "write what you know" in those situations.

Regarding Woody's interest in suspenseful films - I think he has learned to transfer that element into his films - most of his films have some element of that, comedy or not. Someone could write a lengthy essay on that theory I guess.

It should also be noted that one of his favorite comedies (not made by Chaplin, Keaton, Bob Hope or the Marx Bros anyways) is "Airplane!"!

[Fletch F. Fletch]

That Conversations books sounds fantastic. I will have to pick up a copy. I'm really interested in reading any background info on Manhattan as that is my fave Woody Allen film. I figure between this new book and something like Allen on Allen will do the job.

[Dylan]

He does cite Antonioni as his influence in his first foray into making something resembling a "serious" film - the Italian segment in Everything You've Always....

Right. And he also mentions a love for L'Avventura in the (excellent) Dick Cavett interview (available for viewing on YouTube). Then again he's also expressed love for La Dolce Vita many times and that isn't mentioned in the list either. It's a visceral list, like many of our own.

Dylan - I'm assuming you post at IMDB as well. I think we're having this discussion twice about Anything Else. Either that, or you have a secret double who is quoting you nearly verbatim regarding this film.

You are correct, though I hadn't figured it out until you mentioned the Khondji cinematography book. As questionable as the IMDB boards can be, it's usually the first place I go to gather news on Allen's recent films.

Anything Else's reception had everything to do with the way they marketed it, targetting the American Pie audience.

Yeah, and with a total absence of Woody Allen himself in the trailer. I think the film would've done significantly better had it been marketed for what it was rather than what the studio thought would make money.

certainly not that, but it does come across that Woody himself is unaware these types of young people do still exist ... and worse still, Biggs and Ricci also seem unaware two attractive young twentysomethings would be shopping for jazz vinyl. I think it's an example of why you should always stick to the adage of "write what you know" in those situations.

I completely understand where you're coming from, and others have made similar comments relating to Celebrity (Allen being ambitious but "out of touch" insofar as his subject), but personally I never get the impression that he's out of touch with the young literary/"old soul" types (and like you, that's the category my friends and I fall under as well), but maybe these characters and their relationships and (particularly) their use of language just hits me significantly more on a personal level.

You guys have got me all excited about these books!

Be sure and tell us what you think when you read them. BTW Domino, do you have a favorite Woody Allen?

[domino harvey]

BTW Domino, do you have a favorite Woody Allen?

You know the old line, hard to choose a favorite. Woody Allen's like Ingmar Bergman for me, in that he's one of my favorite directors but it's hard to single out one film that would be on a list of my favorites, I'm a fan of his films by accumulation. I've seen all his films except Cassandra's Dream (and obv. Vicki) and a list of 20 Allen films would explain what I love best about him more than one. I do think his Mia Farrow period is his best though. And as far as I'm concerned, he's never "lost it," which makes the recurring "comeback" claims every few years eye-roll-inducing.

[chizbooga]

I thought Singin' in the Rain was his favorite movie!

[johncarvill]

Btw - I should also note that I was fortunate enough to conduct a one hour interview with author Eric Lax about the book and Woody a couple of months ago for a radio program, which due to a variety of reasons, is still in editing and has not yet aired. But I did get some more insights into the making of the book and Woody himself. Eric is as nice a person as they come.

Thanks for all this great info. Yet another book I am now compelled to purchase.

Can you tell us more about the Lax interview? Did it eventually air, or has it been published anywhere?