You will meet a tall dark stranger

Director: Woody Allen
Starring: Anthony Hopkins, Naomi Watts, Josh Brolin, Pauline Collins, Gemma Jones, Freida Pinto and Antonio Banderas
Distributor: Independent
Runtime: 98 mins. Reviewed in Jan 2013

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Rating notes: Coarse language and sexual references

The title is what fortune tellers often tell future-hungry clients who are prepared to believe anything. Most of the characters in this Woody Allen confection, filmed in London (a Woody Allen world of writers, artists, publishers and galleries), have created their own fantasies. One does go to a fortune teller. The others tend to poo-poo superstition but are so locked in their hopes and ambitions that they often refuse to see the truth before them. And for anyone wanting an open ending, for most of the characters, here it is. A number of interesting consequences will come home to roost after the final credits!

Many will complain that this is Woody Allen re-cycling stories and issues. Don’t we all!! But, this one is more interesting insofar as it has no real Allen substitute character talking like him (though many will observe Anthony Hopkins as the ageing man who takes up with a younger woman). It is amusing rather than funny, but that has been characteristic of Allen films in recent years.

There is a very strong international cast with performances worth watching. At the beginning and end is the unexpected character of the ageing Helena, who is really the central character. She is played cannily by British actress Gemma Jones, a mixture of angry rejected wife and eagerly superstitious devotee who is in the hands of Cristal (Shirley Valentine’s own Pauline Collins). Naomi Watts plays her generally level-headed daughter whose marriage is collapsing and who misreads the attentions of her boss (Antonio Banderas). Josh Brolin (after W, Milk and Wall Street 2) is her would-be successful novelist husband. But he has his eye on music student (Freida Pinto, Slumdog Millionaire) in a window across the street.

Anthony Hopkins plays the husband of 40 years who refuses to face age and his wife’s ageing and takes up with an escort (Lucy Punch who makes her an unselfconsciously dopey gold-digger).

There are plenty of secrets and lies, Woody Allen style.