DEBUTOLOGY

REAL DEBUT AS DIRECTOR FOR WOODY ALLEN, STILL HILARIOUS AFTER 44 YEARS

Yes, Take the Money and Run (1969) it’s  the real Woody Allen debut as director, as we ignore What’s Up, Tiger Lily?, screened 3 years before, that credited Allen as co-Director and was actually a re-dubbing of a Japanese spy movie.

In that 1969 Woody was 34 and already at his sixth career, after those as  lines writer for columnists, stand-up comedian, playwright, writer in What’s New Pussycat (1965) and actor in the latter and Casino Royale  (1967), and all these experiences had an important influence on his debut as director.

For example, his  debut as writer and actor was in  What’s New Pussycat, and his screenplay was so mistreated by the producers to convince Woody that he wanted to have full control on his following projects: from Take the Money and Run onward, he has directed every film he has written.

The first step of a more than 40-films career in little more than 40 years, Take the Money and Run, directed as a documentary about the life of very unlucky Virgil Starkwell, it’s still hilarious seen today, with some memorable moments and already includes hints about the topics that will be the red line of his entire career, both in the funny and more mature films (relationships with parents and women, psychoanalysis, hebraism).

This is probably the most famous scene, and still our favourite:

DEBUTOLOGY SCORE: 7/10

BUYING TIPS

DVD
Take the Money and Run – buy it in USA

Take The Money And Run – buy it in UK

if you’re interested in the subject, don’t lose the wonderful 2012 documentary Woody:
US DVD
Woody Allen: A Documentary

UK BLUE-RAY

UK DVD
Woody Allen: A Documentary

In an interwiew included in  this documentary, Woody Allen says:  ”the only thing standing between greatness and me, it’s me”: he’s obsessed to create a still missing masterpiece, and that’s way he’s making a film each year.

And even if  his career isn’t at the same level than his beloved directors (Federico Fellini, Michelangelo Antonioni, Ingmar Bergman, Jean-Luc Godard, Luis Bunuel, Akira Kurosawa, Francois Truffaut, Vittorio De Sica, Bernardo Bertolucci and Jean Renoir just to name a few),  it’s still a very important career, and he has already reached an important position in the history of cinema: that’s why we include a list of all his films as director, with year of production, indication  if Woody was a credited actor, and the average IMDB rating.