Allen doesn't stop at simplicity

Rating: 8/10 (6 December 2012)

Woody Allen's Match Point opens by telling us exactly where it derives its title from. It compares life to that moment in a game of tennis, when a ball is swung and hits the top of the net and for a split second has the option of falling back on your side of the court, penalizing you or, with a little luck, falling on your opponent's side, penalizing them. In a sense, this is a film that questions the mysteries that inhabit life, actually offering up some very interesting existential questions about life and its numerous quirks.
I guess it's too considered a "match point" when you've caught yourself in the middle of a love triangle and are unsure of whether to stay with the one you're officially with or take a risk and form a full, open relationship with the one you've kept "waiting" on the side. The character stuck in this depressing position is Chris Wilton (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), a retired professional tennis player attempting to climb the social ladder in London, as he trains Tom Hewett (Matthew Goode). The two share their love for opera, and along the way, Chris meets Chloe (Emily Mortimer), Tom's sister, and quickly jumps into a relationship with her. That is, until he meets Tom's confident, incredibly sensuous fiancée named Nola Rice (Scarlet Johansson). The woman is bold, beautiful, and gorgeous and knows of this, and becomes smitten with the idea of becoming involved in an affair with Chris, while Chloe is left in the dark. There are a number of twists and unforeseen directions in the film, so spoiling them would be an act of sin.
Allen completely disregards everything he's led us to believe he has been about since his career beginnings in the 1960's. His male archetype is not a neurotic, inept, quirky writer, but a fully brazen and somewhat arrogant womanizer played expertly by Meyers, who embodies this role with true power and intensity. The characters around him that could've been gravely underwritten (for example, Mortimer's Chloe) are developed through monologues in luxurious restaurants, sipping the fanciest wine, talking openly amongst friends and acquaintances. It's scenes like this that Allen nails with a complete and total brash sense of direction and confidence. He portrays these luxurious get-togethers as comfortable, inviting experiences that places the viewer at their table or like a voyeur at a nearby table, listening in on a conversation you're afraid for just because you don't want it to go the way you believe it will.
Aside from Meyers, the wealth of supporting talent that surrounds him is commendable and fascinating. He is greatly assisted by Johansson's deeply passionate, sensuous Nola, and we can see him being persuaded by her just by her simple gaze and her incredible attractive lips.
Match Point could've evolved into a simple love triangle involving a prestigious tennis player desperately struggling to maintain two different girls while he resides in London's upper-class. But two tactics that Allen inserts here comfortably are exploring how someone can climb the social ladder of London, and, inviting in the idea of how luck plays a role in all our lives. He illustrates how sometimes the most despicable, unruly humans get the undeserved good luck, while the good people of the world get shafted with the bad luck.
In multiple ways, this reminded me of Spike Lee's sincere and delightfully efficient directorial debut She's Gotta Have It, which also centered around a love triangle, but instead of exploring the idea of how luck plays into ones life, it examined each character and how they reacted to being part of this triangle. Lee channeled Allen in some respects, with the black and white atmosphere and the dramatic tonality of the screenplay, and both in return made a sufficient picture.
Some consider Allen to come gift wrapped in his own pretentiousness and accuse him for making "odd" pictures that few can connect with. I consider him valuable and a necessity to film; we need people like Allen to show a barrage of different people, with extremely different personalities, that somehow come all together and connect with their traits to make the complex, admirably complete figure that is Woody Allen.
Starring: Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Scarlett Johansson, Emily Mortimer, Matthew Goode, Brian Cox, and Penelope Wilton. Directed by: Woody Allen.