Woody’s Latest Is “Fugacious Whimsy”
I can’t improve upon Todd McCarthy’s review of Woody Allen’s latest picture, “Magic in the Moonlight,” so I won’t bother: ‘At one point in the PBS “American Masters” biography “Woody Allen: A Documentary” that aired on PBS in 2011, the endlessly prolific writer-director empties a box of paper scraps on which he’s jotted down assorted movie ideas over the years; when he finds one he still likes, he explains, he embarks upon his next screenplay. Would that he had tossed aside the “master magician falls in love with the lovely clairvoyant he’s trying to expose†concept that drives the plot of “Magic in the Moonlight,” a fugacious bit of whimsy that can only be judged minor Woody Allen. From the 1920s French setting to the dreamily romantic title, this feels like a pale attempt to recapture a portion of the public that made “Midnight in Paris†by far Allen’s biggest hit ever.’
