Annie Hall

 “Annie Hall”

— Rohan Nambiar

Woody Allen’s Annie Hall simply refuses to leave your mind so easily. It is one of those films where the relationship between Alvy and Annie keeps circling in your head long after the movie ends. Alvy is a comedian by profession. He has very clear opinions about everything and speaks his mind without hesitation. Annie is cheerful, charming, and dreams of becoming a singer. Throughout the film, the dialogues are placed so beautifully that they constantly stir something inside you. It shows the difficult phases of a relationship — the ups and downs, the happiness, the loneliness — as if holding a mirror right in front of us.

Alvy wanders through the streets carrying years of loneliness within him. He has been in therapy for fifteen years. His second marriage has already ended in divorce. Then he meets Annie, and somehow he begins to rediscover himself. They meet while playing tennis. Strangely, while watching the film, I too started falling a little in love with Annie.

After the game, Annie says:
“Hi, hi.”
Alvy replies:
“Oh, hi hi.”

Then Annie seems as if she wants to say something more, but words do not come out. So she awkwardly says:
“Well… bye.”

Alvy says:
“You play well.”

Annie replies:
“Oh, yeah… so do you… Oh God, what a dumb thing to say, right? I mean, you say ‘you play well,’ and then right away I have to say, ‘you play well.’ Oh God, Annie… well, la-de-da… la-de-da…”

Alvy asks:
“You wanna lift?”

Annie replies:
“Oh, why? You got a car?”

Alvy says:
“Me? No. I was gonna take a cab.”

Annie answers:
“Oh no, I have a car.”

Then Alvy jokingly asks why she asked whether he had a car when she herself had one — the way she said it almost sounded like she wanted a lift from him. Annie quickly tries to correct herself and asks if he needs a ride instead. The way Annie speaks, the way she laughs while talking, somehow makes every dialogue feel sweet and deeply alive.

After that, the relationship begins to grow beautifully. Sometimes they are happy, sometimes Alvy becomes suspicious of her. Eventually they break up. Then one night, at three in the morning, while Alvy is in bed with another woman, Annie suddenly calls him. He rushes to her apartment only to discover that Annie had called him because she saw a spider in the bathroom. But really, killing the spider was only an excuse — she wanted to see him, wanted to tell him that she truly loved him. And so they come together once again.

Annie smokes marijuana before sex and washes her face eight hundred times a day with black soap. Alvy turns on a red light before sex. Two strange people with strange little habits — just like all of us and our endless wants and insecurities.

On their way back from an award ceremony, both of them want to say that the relationship is no longer working. But neither can say it first because both are worried about hurting the other. Finally Annie says it, and Alvy accepts it. Alvy had stopped finding happiness in togetherness. But after separation, he realizes that there is something beyond the physical, something deeper. He understands how much he truly loves Annie.

Alvy goes to Los Angeles and asks Annie to return with him to New York. Annie refuses. She says:
“New York is a dead city.”

Alvy returns to New York alone. A man obsessed with thoughts of death is, in truth, desperately trying to live. In the play he later writes, he recreates the chemistry between himself and Annie — only this time the ending is different. In his version, the hero and heroine reunite. The heroine comes back to New York.

This film does not leave you. The chemistry of relationships in it feels painfully familiar. I see parts of myself in it. In every relationship, certain basic things remain the same; certain mistakes remain the same too — only the characters change. Instead of Alvy and Annie, we begin to see ourselves sitting there.

Sometimes we could never force a relationship to survive. Sometimes we felt that maybe, if we had stayed a little longer, given it a little more time, things might have turned out differently. Yet we couldn’t. We still can’t.

Just as Alvy realizes in the end that Annie is the one he truly needs, that without her he feels empty, we too keep searching for someone. Somewhere deep inside every one of us, there is a smiling, innocent face of an Annie that quietly appears and disappears…

(This is not a film review. It is simply a feeling from the heart. I have watched many films before, and I keep watching them again. These are just the thoughts that come to me while watching.)