* * * for Sweet and Lowdown

Rating: 7/10 (13 December 1999)

Woody Allen's film has two things going for it: (1) The jazz guitar score is beautiful, and the scenes where protagonist Emmett Ray is onstage with his band are appropriately charming, fun and had my foot-a-tappin'. Allen loves jazz, and this entire movie exudes the charm of our idyllic '20s and '30s. (2) The film has the enormous benefit of starring Sean Penn, who somehow manages to be a scoundrel, an egomaniacal jerk and an insufferable lout while at the same time being spirited, likable and even charming in an odd sort of way.
Those are two pretty big factors in a character driven film about a jazz musician. Penn works wonders onstage, having mastered the extensive fingerings for the jazz guitar. It's a class act - a daunting job for an actor which he pulls off seamlessly.
Emmett Ray is a womanizing b***ard, and he goes through many ladies throughout the course of the film. Sometimes, this got old (Uma Thurman's one joke ingenue is an insufferably long sequence, but has a good joke at the end.) The critically acclaimed Samantha Morton is tolerable as the mute who loves him, her mannered performance reminiscent of Harpo Marx. Sometimes, it's a little too cutesy - I mean, how many times can you cut to her character eating a ton of food? But she makes a good foil for Penn, her silence forcing him to ramble on hilariously. (After sex he takes out his guitar and asks, "What's your favorite song? snicker Wait, look who I'm askin'!")
Allen also manages to pack in some good comedy, such as Penn taking all his dates to the local dump where he shoots at rats. (When one dame gets on his nerves, he tosses a dead rat casually into her lap.) Or the time he decides to make his stage entrance riding in a big yellow moon. There are so many "Emmett Ray" stories that one of them gets repeated three times. Hilarity ensues.
So I laughed a lot, which is more than I can say for most of Allen's output in the '90s. It's also his most consistent film in years. Sadly, this is the type of project Woody would have knocked off in the old days. Now, it's his finest hour.