Crimes and Misdemeanors

Crimes and Misdemeanors
Original poster
Directed by	Woody Allen
Produced by	Robert Greenhut
Written by	Woody Allen
Starring	Martin Landau Woody Allen Mia Farrow Alan Alda Anjelica Huston Jerry Orbach Joanna Gleason
Music by	Franz Schubert
Cinematography	Sven Nykvist
Editing by	Susan E. Morse
Distributed by	Orion Pictures
Release date(s)	October 13, 1989 (1989-10-13)
Running time	107 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$13 million
Box office	$18,254,702 (United States)

Crimes and Misdemeanors is a 1989 black comedy written, directed by and co-starring Woody Allen, alongside Martin Landau, Mia Farrow, Anjelica Huston, Jerry Orbach, Alan Alda, Sam Waterston and Joanna Gleason.

The film was met with critical acclaim and was nominated for three Academy Awards: Woody Allen, for Best Director; Martin Landau, for Best Actor in a Supporting Role; and Allen again, for Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen.

Plot

In New York City, the story follows two main characters: Judah Rosenthal (Martin Landau), a successful ophthalmologist, and Clifford Stern (Woody Allen), a struggling documentary filmmaker. The men are each confronted with a moral crisis.

Judah's concerns his affair with flight attendant Dolores Paley (Anjelica Huston). After it becomes clear to her that Judah will not end his marriage, Dolores, scorned, intends to inform his wife of their affair. Dolores' letter to Miriam (Claire Bloom) is intercepted and destroyed by Judah, but she sustains the pressure on him with her threats of revelation. She is also aware of some questionable financial moves Judah has made, which adds to his stress.

Judah confides in a patient, Ben (Sam Waterston), a rabbi who is rapidly losing his eyesight. Ben advises openness and honesty between Judah and his wife, but Judah does not wish to imperil his marriage.

He desperately turns to his brother, Jack (Jerry Orbach), who hires a hitman to kill Dolores. Before her corpse is discovered, Judah retrieves letters and other items from her apartment (where he sees her bloody corpse) in order to cover his tracks. Stricken with guilt, Judah turns to the religious teachings he had rejected, believing for the first time that a just God is watching him and passing judgement.

Cliff, meanwhile, has been hired by his pompous brother-in-law, Lester (Alan Alda), a successful television producer, to make a documentary celebrating Lester's life and work. Cliff grows to despise him. While filming and mocking the subject, Cliff falls in love with Lester's associate producer, Halley Reed (Mia Farrow).

Despondent over his failing marriage to Lester's sister Wendy (Joanna Gleason), he woos Halley, showing her footage from his ongoing documentary about Prof. Louis Levi, a renowned philosopher. He makes sure Halley is aware that he is shooting Lester's documentary merely for the money so he can finish his more meaningful project with Levi.

Cliff's disrespect and dislike for Lester become evident in a first screening of the film. It juxtaposes footage of Lester with shots of Benito Mussolini addressing a throng of supporters from a balcony; it also depicts Lester yelling at his employees and clumsily making a pass at an attractive young actress.

Cliff learns that Prof. Levi, whom he had been profiling on the strength of his celebration of life, has committed suicide, leaving a curt note, "I've gone out the window." When Halley visits to comfort him, he makes a pass at her, which she gently rebuffs, telling him she isn't ready for romance in her life.

Adding to Cliff's burdens, Halley leaves for London, where Lester is offering her a producing job; when she returns several months later, Cliff is astounded to discover that she and Lester are engaged. Hearing that Lester sent Halley a bouquet of white roses every week they were in London, Cliff is crestfallen as he realizes he is incapable of that kind of ostentatious display. His last romantic gesture to Halley had been a love letter which, he admits, he had plagiarized almost entirely from James Joyce.

In the final scene, Judah and Cliff meet by happenstance at the wedding of the daughter of rabbi Ben, who is Cliff's brother-in-law and Judah's patient. Once deeply anguished by the murder he arranged, Judah has worked through his guilt and is enjoying life once more; the murder had been blamed on a drifter with a record. He draws Cliff into a supposedly hypothetical discussion that draws upon his moral quandary. Judah says that with time, any crisis will pass; but Cliff morosely claims instead that one is forever fated to bear one's burdens for "crimes and misdemeanors."

Cast

Actor	Role
Martin Landau	Judah Rosenthal
Woody Allen	Cliff Stern
Mia Farrow	Halley Reed
Anjelica Huston	Dolores Paley
Alan Alda	Lester
Jerry Orbach	Jack Rosenthal
Joanna Gleason	Wendy Stern
Claire Bloom	Miriam Rosenthal
Sam Waterston	Ben
Caroline Aaron	Barbara
Stephanie Roth	Sharon Rosenthal
Mercedes Ruehl	Party Guest (uncredited)

Influences

• The outline of Judah's moral dilemma — whether a person can continue with his everyday life with knowledge of having committed a murder — evokes ^[1] the pivotal idea of Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (and provides a resolution opposite to one in the novel). The theme would be revisited by Allen in his movies Match Point and Cassandra's Dream.

Production

• After viewing the first cut of the film, Woody Allen decided to throw out the first act, call back actors for reshoots, and focus on what turned out to be the central story.^[2]

Music

Allen makes use of classical and jazz music in many of the film's scenes. The soundtrack includes Franz Schubert's String Quartet #15 in G, which is used in the scenes leading up to Dolores' death, and Judah discovering her body.

Box office

The North American box office tally for Crimes and Misdemeanors was $18,254,702. See Box Office Mojo http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=crimesandmisdemeanors.htm

References

1. ^ Mary P. Nichols, Reconstructing Woody: Art, Love, and Life in the Films of Woody Allen (Rowman and Littlefield, 2000) ISBN 978-0-8476-8990-3, pp 149-164 (Part 10 The Ophthalmologist and the Filmmaker)
2. ^ "2046". Chicago Sun-Times. http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050901/REVIEWS/50822004/1023. 

External links

• Crimes and Misdemeanors at the Internet Movie Database
• Crimes and Misdemeanors at AllRovi
• Roger Ebert's Review of Crimes and Misdemeanors