Brilliant (and I usually hate Woody Allen movies)

Rating: 9/10 (7 January 2006)

All this talk about "Match Point" being something completely different than anything Woody Allen has ever done, something fresh and surprising, it's true. Allen reinvents himself with this movie. There's no shaky camera, no jazz music and no frantic, quirky dialog. Allen's message is the same, but instead of playing the lovely, cute & clumsy neurotic-card like he did so often, this time he says what he wants to say in an earnest and compelling way. "Match Point" is highly sophisticated cinema without any pretensions (if you overlook the fact that all characters are so smart and educated they could have jumped right out of an Oscar Wilde play). I will admit that although most of Allen's earlier movies are not my cup of tea, objectively speaking some of them have been very important in their own right. It's all the more impressive that after all those movies that made Allen one of the most original filmmakers ever, he's able to redefine himself not only as a director, but also to come up with such a perfect, clever script. I won't go into detail about how gloriously Allen's framework of pictures and monologue works here. It's not too subtle, anyway. What I admire most is the way Allen always puts the events of the story in the foreground with the real, recurring message that our life is arbitrary without sense or meaning hidden between the lines. "Match Point" never bores you and at the same time it appeals to your intellect. How very rare a mixture like that has become these days!
After all these years, Allen has become a master in modeling believable characters and situations. Needless to say that the acting is brilliant, too. Allen simply refuses to work with anyone but the best. Scarlett Johansson is everybody's darling right now and rightly so. Her eroticism is natural and her performance leaves nothing to be desired. The rest of the (mostly British) cast is just as great. It's good to see Johnathan Rhys-Meyers making a worthy "comeback" after he's already promised so much in "Velvet Goldmine".
Well, what more can I say than that this movie has even convinced a guy like me who's always had a disliking for Woody Allen and his movies. "Match Point" is just too damn good to hold a grudge. Let me put it this way (and God, I wonder how many reviewers have already used that term): Game, Set & Match: Allen!