To Rome with Love Movie Review

Woody Allen continues his new millennium tour of Europe with a jaunt to Rome in his latest comedy, To Rome with Love. Perhaps after churning out a movie a year like clockwork for the last 30 odd years, Woody finally tired of New York City as a setting for contemporary stories of relationships and intellectualism. Though the backdrop has shifted recently from London to Barcelona to Paris and now the Eternal City, the signature wit has remained. It hasn’t always worked well but I’m glad that he put out one more fine film in Midnight in Paris before the inevitable end of Woody. To Rome with Love is a bit of a letdown after last year’s wonderful fantasy.

Inception Movie Review

A unifying theme has slowly emerged from the film work of Christopher Nolan. He is fixated on the idea of perception and the conflict of illusion vs. reality. In Memento, a man believes he can be sure of certain facts despite being incapable of creating new memories after about 15 minutes (in the end we learn his foolproof system allows for self-delusion). Insomnia looks at the effects of sleep deprivation on the conscious mind and The Prestige is about the way people can be deceived by distracting the mind with misdirection. Nolan’s latest film, Inception, perhaps shares more in common with his first feature than with anything else in his impressive body of work. But for the chance at a spoiler I shall say no more than that.