Film review: Whatever Works by Woody Allen

**this review contains spoilers (that shouldn't affect your enjoyment of the film at all)**

One of the constants of living in Prague is the dearth of good films in theaters. We do get plenty of American films, but it’s mostly just the blockbusters. The odd indie film will sometimes make it over, but that’s usually because of either the director or an actor being someone Czechs already know and like.

I discovered that the new Woody Allen flick, Whatever Works is playing, and, although it seems almost too easy to dialogue with a Woody Allen movie in the light of Ecclesiastes, I wasn’t sure Robin Hood’s pre-story was going to work for me. I knew nothing of Whatever Works going into it, except that Larry David stars. I know he was a producer and writer on “Seinfeld” (which I liked), and I saw part of an episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” (which I didn’t like).

Allen lays out his thoughts on religion and life immediately in this film, as David’s character, Boris, talks with his friends as the film opens (David takes the place of Allen’s usual neurotic New York Jew in this movie). Boris tells his friends that the main problem with all religions is that they assume goodness in people. He, on the other hand, sees humans as a failed species. The only thing to be done in this world is take pleasure where it can be had, because nothing means anything.

Boris starts talking into the camera, which he does throughout the film (a typical Allen device), to the consternation of the other characters, who don’t see the audience. Boris tells us of his first marriage, which looked great on paper, he says, but life is not on paper. As the marriage ended badly, he jumped out a window but landed on an awning, his life spared. One night a teen-aged runaway persuades him to let her into his apartment, and she ends up staying longer than he planned. He complains of her idiocy and naivete but grows so used to her and her way of parroting his own words that he decides to marry her. The girl, Melody, is from Louisiana, and first her mother and then her father come to New York to find her. Hilarity ensues.

The film actually is quite funny. There were plenty of laugh-out-loud moments, which is something I haven’t experienced in an Allen film for a while. Czechs tend to love Allen, testified to by the rather large number of audience members at 8 on a Wednesday night. I found myself laughing at the same time as the rest of the crowd, which doesn’t often happen, either.

Larry David has wonderful timing and seems to be pretty much playing himself as the kvetching old guy (what it must be like to sit in a room with David and Allen!). Evan Rachel Wood, as Melody, looks much younger than I remembered her, and seems to be doing her best Sookie Stackhouse impression. The scene-stealer, as always, is the fabulous Patricia Clarkson, as Melody’s mother, Marietta.

Marietta arrives after searching for Melody and is horrified at Melody’s choice of a husband, and promptly goes about finding a better match for her. Marietta just left her husband for cheating on her with her best friend, and she finds comfort (and life-changing career advice) from first one then a second friend of Boris. And goes from being a typical Southern Christian married woman to a Bohemian artist living with two men. Late in the film Melody’s father (Ed Begley, Jr., typically histrionic) knocks on her door, as well, and goes through the same protestations as Marietta about Melody’s life choices. In the end, he finds comfort at a bar in the arms of a gay man, and realizes he’s been a closet homosexual his entire life. Melody ends up with her mother’s choice for her, Randy, and divorces Boris, who again attempts suicide. This time he lands on top of a woman, a psychic, who recovers nicely and becomes his lover.

So all of our characters find love in the course of the film, although rather unconventionally. Which is what the title, Whatever Works, is referring to. Boris repeats his mantra of romance being crazy, and life not working out as you expect it to, so we all need to find love wherever we can, in whatever way we can.

Allen, via Boris, is extremely critical of religions and philosophies in this film. He’s pretty evenhanded in poking fun at all of them (one of the biggest laughs in the film involves concentration camps), and it occurred to me that, in this film, most of the people spouting religion or philosophy don’t know what on earth they’re talking about. They’re mostly saying what they’ve heard. And it all sounds ridiculous coming from their mouths, whether it’s religious Christianity or string theory. Empty thoughts, whether of God or philosophy, are simply empty.

Like Qoheleth in Ecclesiastes, Allen serves as a corrective to those who would offer the platitudes they find in religion. Life doesn’t work out the way we want it to: so we do what we can. Boris’s first speech to the camera could be a 21^st century nutshell version of Ecclesiastes. The world is an unfair, scary place (the horror!) that doesn’t make sense. We enjoy what we have and we are grateful. Boris’s last speech has lovely moments, like when he encourages us to be aware of and grateful for every temporary measure of grace, whatever love you can find, whatever happiness you have. He attributes these things to luck, and not to God, but he realizes they are a gift.

Allen is a cynic regarding humanity and God, for certain. But he is a believer in grace, in humor, and in love. This film is probably my favorite of Allen’s films, not only because of its light touch and great humor, but because of the way he allows love to triumph, even when it makes no sense. There are those who may disagree with Allen’s representation of loving relationships, and with a title like Whatever Works, it may be that he’s pushing the gay-marriage agenda, but I don’t think so. I think he’s more concerned with communicating the joy and grace love brings to our sad little lives.