The Purple Rose Of Cairo (1985)

'The Purple Rose of Cairo' is a bit of an enigma of a film from the renowned writer/director Woody Allen. The story is of Cecilia, well played by Mia Farrow who draws real sympathy from a rather weak character, who lives in an american town during the depression era and her adventures - or troubles - when a movie star (or one who'd like to think he was) walks out of the screen and into her life.

Jeff Daniels plays two characters both the fictional movie character (Tom Baxter) and the actor who plays him (Gil Shepherd). It is he who is the real star of the film and he is fantastic (taking over the role from a pre 'Beatlejuice' Michael Keaton two weeks into filming. The film is not only technically marvellous in this aspect but also Daniels draws two distinctly different characters and personalities and is great playing for laughs, sympathy or just general endearment. With my personal comedic highlight being the scene with Tom Baxter in a brothel.

In this film, the masterful and quite regular Woody Allen collaborator Gordon Willis is the cinematographer and he creates contrasting styles for the everyday life scenes and those inside the movie. The depression era town is filmed with a pallet of browns and dingy colours to reflect the gloomy status and way of life in the town. Willis obviously had much fun both recreating a 30s movie to film in and to show as part of the plot. Shiny monochrome is used to show the gleaming and seemingly perfect fictional reality sharply different to dull real life.

The film is also extremely inventive especially with the scenes of the characters in the film talking to the people and viewers at the cinema in real life. This is delightfully staged by Allen and is just on example of the technical prowess on show (influences from Allen's previous work, most notably his masterpiece 'Zelig', are there to be seen).

In the film, lots of bold themes are included: the sometimes blurred reality of movies and real life being the main one and this is addressed in the sudden and quite shocking ending. The problem herein is that the whole tone of the film feels slight and whimsical. This is why the ending feels like such a contrast to that earlier humour, charm and really quite cheerful feeling even to events such as Cecilia's bad and quite violent home-life where it is never thoroughly addressed by Allen and the viewer always feels like its going to be alright.

But more than Allen's themes of social realism, 'The Purple Rose of Cairo' is most of all the film-maker's love letter to cinema in it's purest form: as entertainment and an escape from real life. It is this that comes through most in the economical 78 minutes; especially in his recreation of a 30s film and this is where the film simply soars.

So overall, 'The Purple Rose of Cairo' is a good and mostly enjoyable film (with lots of moments of subtle humour: especially from Daniel's fictional movie character) up until the end where Allen struggles to meet the previous light tone to the more serious and morose ending.

A confusing but mostly lovable film from Allen on good form.