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Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Excellent but underrated film

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Once again Woody Allen decides to take a potshot at Warren Beatty the man who had an dalliance with Allen's former lover Diane Keaton.Zelig is a mockumentary. Whereas Beatty's Reds was a film about idealistic Americans during the Russian Revolution in a documentary framework, this treads a similar path with comedic effect.Woody Allen plays Leonard Zelig, a human chameleon who assimilates with the people around him. It was observed in a swanky Long Island party where F Scott Fitzgerald was present. Zelig spoke with a posh accent with fellow guests and was a Republican, later he was found downstairs in the house with the servants using more coarser dialect where he was a Democrat.In fact Zelig can not only take on the traits of the people around him he can even change colour so he looks and peaks Chinese when he is with Chinese people.Zelig's condition sends the medical world in a frenzy and psychiatrist Dr Eudora Fletcher (Mia Farrow) is determined to cure his personality disorder. Eventually Zelig is cured and he and Eudora fall in love.Allen's film which is mostly in black and white also successfully integrated the concept of splicing characters into old footage such as Zelig sitting behind Hitler in a rally but really they are well staged re-enactments. This concept became popular in adverts and films such as Forrest Gump.Allen has fun with the 1920s setting with songs from the era but it also comes across as rather flat emotionally and a one joke film. The film will give you a few smirks and make you marvel at its cleverness.

Like Allen's earlier Take the Money and Run, which was one of the first ever mockumentaries, Zelig has a whimsical perspective on life. The distanced, self-serious retrospective that the faux-documentary style comes with therefore is a great match for Allen's comic sensibilities. In Zelig, he engages with the many facets of the eponymous Leonard Zelig's identity, and takes aim at even the most prominent of targets, namely the Catholic Church and Hitler's Nazi party, without ever seeming like slowing down. Of course, although the format presents itself as informative and possessing great insight, it is anything but. Zelig's conditions allows Allen the openest of conveniences to slot himself in any historical moment he pleases without the slightest hint of illogic or absurdity. Well, perhaps less the latter, but Allen is smart enough to not over-do any of his gags, or to draw too much attention to them. Sneaking into Hitler's elite seamlessly and then suddenly wondering and waving about as if he has no idea why he is there could be such an easy and tasteless joke to make, but here it is played completely straight. The narrators address the event with such concern and serious regard (even a former SS Obergruppenfuhrer grumpily recalls the scenes) and Hitler was reportedly "extremely upset". Mild, and at the same time, a hilarious image is formed. It is nothing at all like what happened in the film adaptation of the fateful meeting. Allen is particularly fond of these deconstructions within his work: see The Purple Rose of Cairo for an entire film on this treatment. Partly why this approach is so believable and successful is because of the technical lengths and achievements that went into integrating the bluescreen footage into the various archival scenes. Fervent critics of Allen might accuse his ego of taking over his films, making himself the centre stage of all the events - imagine if Allen had been as explicit as Forrest Gump. But what makes Zelig work is precisely the opposite; his knack for blending into a scenario like a chameleon renders the thin, pasty face of Allen (and there is no spotting that red hair) almost unrecognisable, and the delight is in how long we can accept a scene for what it is before we suddenly realise where he is. Long- time collaborator Gordon Willis has done a brilliant job of this - the filters, the grain, the decay of the negatives, it all looks authentic. This allows Allen to play with the format in his own way, slip in jokes that would be much less effective overtly. My favourite is the solemn voice-over concerning Zelig's overconfidence which leads him to adamantly disagree with other's opinions. The elderly Fletcher narrates this as some grave medical condition, and all the way during, we see Zelig get comedically violent with a rake with the group of doctors. The exaggerated, slapstick movements are nevertheless visible in the film grain. There is another subversion of the format; Fletcher uses hypnosis in order to draw out intensely personal confessions from the childhood of Zelig (Allen has always had an intense fascination with psychoanalysis). He drones off with the usual beginnings ("My brother beat me" "I just want to fit in") and then trails off in awkwardly hilarious monologues about cheap rabbis and the terrible quality of Fletcher's pancakes (at which point Farrow, red-faced, tries to look away into the distance even though Zelig is not even aware of her). Take the Money and Run was funny enough, but the humour was a little disjointed, and a lot of the jokes felt like leftover bits that Allen wanted to no go to waste. This, on a whole, is more sophisticated and integrated, and knows exactly how to use the mockumentary format to its advantage.

This could well be a review of 90% of Woody Allen's oeuvre. The film is a smorgasbord of fabulousness - exquisite concepts, very clever lines and very funny ones. No film maker has ever had such a grasp of irony, sarcasm and the ridiculous, and still imbue it with wit and (occasionally) subtlety. But it is the relentless self-deprecation and extant feelings of worthlessness that eventually become wearing after you have watched as many Allen films as I have. This is the film that most impresses you with his confusion over identity however. I could go on about self-analysis for pages but it's unnecessary...just watch any given Woody Allen film. He mellows it out with a rather forlorn sense of romance that becomes endearing rather than pathetic...a skill that is essential to engage with his films. This is a fine film. Oh yeah...and very funny...if you get the references.

I'm starting to think that I've underrated Woody Allen. Sure, he can make some half-hearted stinkers but his good stuff is the best of the best. It's remarkable how he can take this simple surreal idea and have it blossom into a unique experience with a mockumentary style. Not only is it profound and heartfelt, but also hilarious every time Zelig's chameleon-like condition effects him. From the plot line, I thought it was some kind of gimmick, but the fact that it's involuntary and Zelig is played as such a blank and naive slate makes him brilliant and sometimes quite relatable. It touches on one of the greatest social dilemmas of the human condition. Blend in at the expense of personal identity or be opinionated and ostracised? This idea hits the gut. Hard.The cause-and-effect of Zelig's condition is highlighted by its broad stroke documentary style where information is given by a narrator or talking head interviews. Consequences are shown immediately and allows the film in its 70 minutes runtime to explore a vast amount of detail, especially in studying celebrity culture and how icons are embraced then ignored. We only get snippets of Zelig himself which are often Allen delivering sharp punchlines but it's Mia Farrow's involvement that gives it a heart. I usually don't feel too engaged by Allen's romances but this one I really wanted to see them get together. With its technical prowess in its innovation matching its profound ideas and creativity, this is one well-rounded picture and one of Allen's best works.9/10