MÜPA FILM CLUB
Café Society (2016)
Being Woody Allen
Though critics did like this film, they were far from bowled over by it. Most thought of it as a typical Woody Allen movie, where everything is predictable, though they certainly appreciated the visuals - Vittorio Storaro was the cinematographer. At first glance, it seems familiar. There is a love triangle (Steve Carell - Jesse Eisenberg - Kristen Stewart), a broken marriage, Hollywood, New York. And with the story taking place in the 1930s, jazz is everywhere. No big deal. Yet the film also has another layer that few people have discussed. Café Society also sees the appearance of a Jewish family from the Bronx.
The youngest boy, Bobby, may be the focal point of the story, but the other members of his family are far from mere extras. His dad is a jeweller, though not the wealthy kind. His mother is a straight-up Yiddishe mama. Bobby's older sister is a teacher, her husband a Communist. His older brother is a gangster. (It doesn't end well.) His uncle is a successful Hollywood agent. Family. And some things stay in the family. Other things are funny. Such as the fact that, in Hollywood, Bobby has no desire to take advantages of a rookie prostitute when it turns out the girl is Jewish. But then what should you make of his gangster brother, who has no qualms about burying people in concrete, and who, at a dramatic point in his life, has himself baptised? Understandable, perhaps, given that Jewish people don't have an afterlife. A side story? A little spice, Woody Allen style? Presumably it is as important as comparing Hollywood with Manhattan. And perhaps those few sentences the narrator (Woody Allen) drops into the story as he describes the club that Bobby will own as a place where various celebrities, magnates, gangsters and politicians pass the time away, are more than just mere decoration. So don't be fooled by Café Society's apparent lightness of touch. There are serious moral questions at stake here, if you are willing to hear them...
Director: Woody Allen
Host: András Réz
Presented by: Müpa Budapest
