Manhattan is an exhilarating American romance set against the backdrop of New York of the late 70's: my favorite New York, the New York of painters, poets, punks, and Pauline Kael. Three great, very American talents -- Woody Allen, Gordon Willis, and George Gershwin -- intertwine their respective gifts to create a comedy that manages to satisfy both the brain and the heart, and even, perhaps, the lower regions.
Allen is so brainy and such a nebbish that he can get away with gestures that would be painfully sentimental in the hands of any other director: when he begins the movie with fireworks cut to Gershwin, it isn't to soften you up for a soap opera, but to remind you that however much his neuroses may seem to drive the scenes, its the love of New York that drives the movie.
The entire cast is note perfect: Meryl Streep as his caustic bisexual ex-wife, Diane Keaton as a nervous journalist from Philadelphia, and especially Mariel Hemingway, whose performance as Allen's 17-year old girlfriend is charming, heartbreaking, and wise.
Allen's comedy here is at its absolute finest. The fact that it is interwoven with a genuinely moving love story told with a subtlety and indirection that is unheard of in today's mainstream cinema only makes the laughs that much richer.
Gordon Willis' cinematography is good enough for the Museum of Modern Art. Scene after scene leaves a grin on your face as his moving (in both senses) black and white photography floats across the screen.
And finally underlying everything is the music of George Gershwin, whose exubertant melodies propel the movie forward at every turn.
This is Woody Allen's best movie, a great movie, and an American movie in the best sense. As an homage to the city of New York it will surely remain unsurpassed.
