Bad plagiarism. Bad story composition.

Rating: 4/10 (22 June 2006)

This film is a bad copy of a Dostoyevski's book (Crime and Punishment, in particular). It is written and directed in a way to suggest deeper meaning, but it has not anything deep within it.
While we expected something to be justified or explained along the story evolved, there is no such counterpart in the presented work. It is plain simple pure Hollywood story without essence.
This film is not evenly distributed - or the end comes too soon. If Woody Allen thought of something else for an end, and it could not be fitted in the expected length of a classical film (we saw that the film was 2:04h which is quite long) that could explain, in a way, the stupid end. Every other explanation is unacceptable.
My personal opinion is that the machinery behind the Woody Allen is big and fully commercial, but he is dead and gone altogether. The machinery waits for anything he wants and realizes it, relying just on he's name to sell it big. It is a classical story, seen too many times. For him, the best would be either to go into religious waters in order to calm himself, or just to peacefully accept the fact that he is old and gone.
Tehnically he could do some other projects, but since the life energy and creativity have evidently left him, he should not pursue the film business anymore.
Film does not deserve the hype about it. Apart from Scarlett Johansson's beauty, there is really not much to be seen in it.
This and such films are lowering the quality of certain film category. Which category is that? It is not strictly commercial, but it is heavily involved on making money. It is not the art category, but it relies on major population which prefers art films. So, inside this category, one would expect more intriguing, deeper, more markant story.
I really thought that the film would make some point to me.
And it did. The point made was this: "Stick to the books if you want to find deeper grounds". As simple as that.