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 ey, young people! (We know you're out there.) You may have heard that pantheon

writer-director Woody Allen's Stardust Menoies came as a bit of a shock to

Allen's fans when it was released in 1980. That, let me tell you, would be an
this writer speaks as someone for whom the memory
of that moment is indelible unto death (a concept to which Allen might be partial). lt's
important t0 contextualize here; this was a film that arrived after four major mileslones
for the comedian{urned{ilmmaker: the hilarious pastiche of Russian litefttve, Love and
Death (1975, also a Twilight Time release); the groundbreaking, loveable, multi-Academy

Awardo-winning Annie Hall (1977\t the startlingly Bergmanesque change-of-pace drama,

hbn1rs (1g79l; and the beautiful, bittersweet Manhattan (19791. our W00dy was riding
high-and, on the evidence of Stardust Memoies , he didn't like it one little bit.
The most obviously sellreferential of his hlns, Stardust Memor,es focuses on Allen
surrogate Sandy Bates (played, of course, by the writerdirector, who really seems to have
a grasp on his character), a-surprise!-comedian-turned{ilmmaker who's basically
having a kind of breakdown as he deals with his celebrity-and particularly, with his
fans. Modeled on Federico Fellini's superb 81/z (19631-an indubitable classic about the
Italian filmmakefs atempts t0 manage fame, relationships, his past, and his 'blocked"
creativity-Stardust Memoies is a lar more sour, even acidic, movie. That, at least, is
how formerly enthusiastic critics and Allen adherents saw it in 1980: as a brutal slap in
the lace. An outraged Pauline Kael took it personally, calling the film "a honible betrayal."
And Andrew Sarris in The Village fo,ce observed that il seemed "t0 have been shaped by a

masochistic desire to alienate Allen's admirers once and for all."

There were certainly plenty of reasons for these critics and many of the filmmakels
devotees t0 feel s0 dissed. Built around Sandy's appearance at a "Film Culture Weekend"
(based on a real-life Tanytown film seminar organized by critic Judith Crist-appearing
brielly here as a cabaret patron-whom Allen rather disingenuously has said, "l liked very
much"), it offers up a ghastly world of treakish sycophancy. Sandy's lans are presented as
a band 0f repellent oddities, otfering him resum6s and headshots, begging for handouts,
gifting him with giant salamis, and confiding intimate details along the lines 0f, "l was a
caesarean." These are subjects for Diane Arbus or Tod Browning as opposed to Fellini's
more sympathetically rendered, often quite touching outsiders. Even Allen's veteran
casting director, Juliet Taylor, would note that "someone would come in and Woody would
really have to bite his lip not 10 laugh, because the person would be s0 funny to him and
exactly what he was thinking." Yikes.
 But here's the thing. With a little time and distance-and repeated viewings-we realize thal
what repels Sandy about his adherents is, shockingly, what he has in common with them, Despite the
fame and the 0scars and the Rolls Royce (driven, amusingly, by a felon/chaufteur), Sandy still thinks
of himsell as a misfit. How else t0 explain the opening fantasy/dream sequence (the first of many in
the film)? Here, honifyingly, he finds himself 0n a train full of freaks like him: odd-looking, paralyzed

by doubt, and probably Jewish (the Holocaust cattle car echoes here cannot be accidental). He looks

desperately through the car window and across the tracks, where he sees another train, full 0l the

beautiful people, having what appears t0 be an endless rave-up; a gorgeous blonde shiksa (none other
than Sharon Stone, in her film d6but) gives him a mocking moue of a kiss. He batters at the window,
trying to escape (from who he is, n'est-ce pa!l), with utter futility, Later, of course, we discover that
bothtrainsendupatthesamefatalplacer agiganticgarbagedumpcircledbywheeling,cryinggulls.

This is a scene from Sandy's latest, embattled movie; the honified executives who used to love
him note that "He's not funny any more," while many 0f his fans (including a band ol space aliens, who

mysteriously appear late in the film) hand him a variation of a line lhat's become part of the Allen canon:
"We enjoy your films, particularly the early funny ones." Sandy doesn't deny that his preoccupations

have changed; the proof is in the murals that adorn the stark white walls of his New York apartment:

Groucho Marx displaced by photojournalist Eddie Adams' infamous Pulitzer-winning picture of South .誠

VietnameseGeneralNguyenNgocLoanexecutingVietCongcaptainBayLopatpoint-blankrange. But

we believe that Allen is fully cognizant of the joke-anyone who'd have this mural on

、量 轟鸞．・
let's face it-and
his wall is a bit of an ass, particularly when he has a chauffeurdriven Roller and a maid who sets fire

to the kitchen while preparing him a dinner of furry little rabbit and, notably, an awlul lot of ludicrously

diff icult girlf riends.

Sandy is particularly haunted by the craziest ol the lot, the gorgeous, "interesting" Donie, fabulously

題
incarnated by Charlotte Rampling, who lends Stardust Memoies some of its most unforgettable
imagery: namely, her face, in closeup, alternately seductive and tormented. Poor Dorrie is stunning
but apparently bi-p0lar, an anorexic (Rampling's collarbones should have a separate credit) and a drug
addict,drivenbyafearsomeElectracomplex. Allofwhich,0fcourse,makeshercatniptoSandy,who
only has to hear the words, " l'm trouble" t0 fall madly in lust. This happens, also, during the Film Culture
構
、
Weekend, when he meets Daisy (Jessica Harpe|, a bisexual violinist who tells him the same thing. And ゝ
・喘■
then there is lsobel (the wonderful Marie-Christine Barrault), a solidly grounded Frenchwoman with
whom he's been having an affair; she swiftly loses some ol her charm when she informs him that she's
leaving her husband-but gains ground when she confesses that she wants to take it slow and not rush
lr、
ま
増
into anything with him. This is Sandy's modus operandi. running from commitment until commitment

is denied. Then, he gets needy.

餘
 ︱ノ ノ
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 Let's face it: Woody's at least as hard, here, on himself as he is 0n his lans and critics. Not unexpectedly.

he also gives the back of his cinematic hand to a group of movie executives baffled by his latest effort,
including Saturday irghf !ye's Laraine Newman and, amusingly, Andy Albeck (a real-lile United Artists exec),
and Jack Rollins (one of Allen's long-time manager-producers). Among the notable cameo players are also

Allen pal/stock company member Tony Roberts, a very young Daniel Stern (who would also appear in Allen's

1986hil, Hannah and Her Sisterc), and the filmmakefs ex-wife and occasional collaborator Louise Lasser,
incarnating a ditsy personal assisiant.

Making their presence known here, t0o, are s0me of Allen's most treasured longtime collaborators:
production designer Mel Bourne, costume designer Santo Loquasto, editor Susan E. Morse, and particularly,
cinematographer Gordon Willis, who gifts the film-and us-with chilly, silvery black-and-white imagery that
gives anything lrom the French New Wave 0r the ltalian Neo-Realists a run for its money.

None of these heroic filmmakers would be acknowledged by the Academy or the Golden Globes, or any

institution, really (although the Writers Guild would nominate Allen for Best Comedy Written Directly for the
Screen). Everyonewasjusttoomad,tooinsulted,too-somehow-letdown. Andyet,decadeslatet,Stardust

Memones lo0ks a far more serious effort than it was ever acknowledged to be. There are apereus here that

are genuinely startling. The awful fantasy in which Sandy imagines being shot dead by a lan who announces,
"Sandy, you know you're my hero" before he pulls the trigger would have its tragic real-life fulfillment just a
‘議 ︱ 〓 ト

few months later with the assassination of John Lennon. The filmmaker's backhanded recognition that all his
philosophical questions are a luxury-only lor people who aren't starving-is both deeply telt and profoundly

grave. And Sandy's search for "something to give life meaning"-echoed in so many Allen movies-is one
with which we all can identify. Despite all the evident crazy, it's the simple things, Allen tells us, thal give life
significance: a breezy spring day, the music oi Louis Armstrong, the woman he loves (mad Donie) looking, for
once, happy. lt's a lovely vision, and the tragic question is, why is this so hard to achieve?

Kirgo
-Julie
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