Manhattan

1979 Directed by Woody Allen

Manhattan explores how the life of a middle-aged television writer dating a teenage girl is further complicated when he falls in love with his best friend's mistress.

Woody Allen Diane Keaton Michael Murphy Mariel Hemingway Meryl Streep Anne Byrne Hoffman Karen Ludwig Michael O'Donoghue Gary Weis Kenny Vance Tisa Farrow Damion Sheller Wallace Shawn Helen Hanft Bella Abzug Victor Truro Charles Levin Karen Allen David Rasche Mark Linn-Baker Frances Conroy Bill Anthony John Doumanian Raymond Serra

Alternative Titles

Manhetenas, Menhetn, Манхатън, 맨하탄, 맨해튼

romance comedy drama

96 mins More details at IMDb TMDb Report this film

Popular reviews

Review by Mike D'Angelo ★★★★★ 20

100/100
[originally written on my blog]
I don't understand how you make a film that looks like this and then go on to make 32 subsequent films (and counting) that look nothing like this. But then, neither do I understand how you achieve the perfect synthesis of your many gifts and somehow conclude that you totally whiffed, to the point where you beg the studio to destroy the negative. Each of the film's tricky balancing acts—between visual beauty and verbal dexterity, between wit and pathos, between the specific and the universal—couldn't be more sublimely realized; like most every masterpiece, it's a tiny, insular story that nonetheless embodies human folly at its most ubiquitous and grandiose. That Woody chooses to make…
Review by 👽hayley👽 ★½ 19

woody allen attempts to make a 42 year old having a relationship with a 17 year old girl romantic and acceptable lmao nice try ya creep
Review by maria ★★ 35

no amount of beautiful b&w cinematography can save this self indulgent, pretentious and perverted dogshit
Review by Aaron ★★★★★ 10

“Chapter One. He was as tough and romantic as the city he loved. Behind his black-rimmed glasses was the coiled sexual power of a jungle cat—oh, I love this. New York was his town, and it always would be.”
Is life fundamentally sweet or sour? Depends on your point of view, I suppose. You get a new job, make a new friend, fall in love—life is honeyed and worth living. You lose that job, have a falling out with that friend, fall out of love—life is curdled and should be thrown out. The funny thing is, those circumstances don’t parcel themselves out discretely. They tend to coexist. You get a promotion but have a fight with your spouse about the…
Review by Kall S ★★★ 2

As if any of those women would actually put up with Woody Allen's annoying face for five minutes.
Review by Branson Reese 5

Although it was public knowledge I had no idea Woody Allen was a creepy sexual predator when I saw this and formed my opinion on it in high school. What follows is that opinion:
Jesus dude we get it, you’re sad and you think NYC looks pretty. This movie is for divorced men who think their affairs make them misunderstood geniuses. Also I am 17 and I am wearing a Me First & The Gimmee Gimmees shirt as I think this.
Review by Dragonknight ★★★★ 7

Film #3 of Florin's Recommendations
“I feel like we're in a Noel Coward play. Someone should be making martinis.”
Isaac Davies is the typical Woody Allen character, an underachieving intellectual who is not confident enough to do what he wants to do in life, someone who is living a romantically –and of course sexually- problematic life and seems to struggle with the endless complexities of human relationships, someone who has always been one step away from achieving success but the fear of rejection and the lack of confidence have kept him from reaching greatness and happiness, an individual who is desperately searching for the meaning of life in a time and place where things- thanks to modernization- are changing so…
Review by travis kyker 🍂 ★★★★ 20

I watched this while eating a bowl of soup. I can’t explain why but it felt appropriate. Now I’m thinking about movies I would add to the soup canon if such a thing existed. The Fog, perhaps. Inside Llewyn Davis, certainly. Anything shot by Gordon Willis, which explains this. Soup movies ftw!
Review by Paul Elliott ★★★★★ 3

Captured in impressively magnificent black and white, Manhattan embraces some imaginative and distinctive filmmaking and functions as the predecessor of a myriad of romantic comedies which succeeded it. It commences with a sequence of glamorous images of the commercial and cultural centre of New York City establish on the enchanting music of George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, and it's a visual cruise which cinematographer Gordon Willis (whose work also includes The Godfather) returns to throughout the film.
Woody Allen portrays a television comedy writer whose dissatisfied with his career and possesses yearnings of writing a novel, and from the opening montage, the film is flowing with communicated opinions ostensibly affiliated with the filmmaker. The recurring fixation with the design and construction of the borough demonstrates a more comprehensive portrayal is submitted than just the relationships of a small number of bewildered residents, and between its stunning images and beautiful music, Manhattan manages to create something very special.
Review by Ryan Daniel ★★★★½ 6

“I could tell by your voice over the phone. Very authoritative, like the Pope or the computer in 2001.”
I am pretty amazed at the visuals in this film. It still has the incredibly witty, genuine writing that I was expecting, but I wasn’t expecting it to be so beautiful. I adore the way this film is shot, and the music is perfect for the atmosphere that the camera creates.
Now as much as I love the writing, the actual story hasn’t aged well. I stand by separating an artist from their art, but seeing Woody Allen date a 17 year old is a little too on the nose. Reminds me of watching Kevin Spacey in American Beauty; it’s still great, but I can see why there’s some eyebrows being raised.
Review by Neil Bahadur ★½ 2

You've got to be kidding me
Review by Justin Peterson ★★★★ 13

(Catching Up on the Classics Series)
A story about fickle relationships, paired with neurotic humor, engaging closeup photography, noting an appreciation for the arts, and set in a beautiful romanticized city ... yup that's the Woody Allen formula.
"Chapter One. He was as tough and romantic as the city he loved. Behind his black-rimmed glasses was the coiled sexual power of a jungle cat. Oh, I love this. New York was his town, and it always would be."
Wow, does that first scene do a great job of capturing the writing process, as Allen narrates the first chapter of the book he is writing. But keeps stopping and starting over since he does not like the tone he is using.…

Recent reviews

Review by Joaquín ★★★★

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

De las infinitamente complejas nimiedades del humano.
Con el diario del lunes (40 años después): Flatulento final.
Review by 𝙢𝙖𝙧𝙠 ★★★★

Woody Allen es un genio
Review by fjgalati ★★★½

Lindo e Poético
Review by jmc2000 ★★★★

Haved loved this movie for a long time but it has only gotten much more PROBLEMATIC.
Review by Olivia G Campbell ★★★½

"...You have to have a little faith in people"
Pensé que me iba a gustar más.
En algún momento la volveré a ver y me va a gustar más.
Review by Falcast ★★★½

Bien bacanita la peli, se contrastan diferentes puntos de vista filosoficos, morales... Mucho texto, pero claro, es lo que uno se espera cuando ve Manhattan
Review by Gianefilo ★★★★

“Io non mi arrabbio, va bene? Io tendo ad interiorizzare. Non so esprimere l'ira, è uno dei problemi che ho. Io mi allevo un tumore piuttosto”.
Review by T ★★★½

*** english version below ***
So recht weiß ich nicht, wie ich den Film bewerten soll.
Positiv hervorheben muss man die Leichtigkeit, die dem Zuschauer entgegenströmt. Man hat nicht das Gefühl, er würde um "das große Ganze" gehen, sondern eher das Irren von Smalltalk zu Smalltalk, eher um das Zwischenmenschliche.
Dabei ist die Verstrickung der Protagonisten in den Einzelfällen so alltäglich wie sie nur sein können, im Zusammenhang allerdings so komplex, dass die Handlung des Filmes nie langweilig wird.
Star ist, neben der Chemie zwischen Woody Allen und Diane Keaton, ganz klar New York. Die Stadt wird von der Kamera eingefangen und wie ein Kunstwerk inszeniert. Egal ob die turbulenten Straßenszenen, oder die stillen Bilder, die wie Scherenschnitte wirken.
Das…
Review by Ruth Spera ★★½

really shows how woody allen's a pedophile
Review by will45290 ★★★★★

Wayyy better than Annie hall but contextually hasn’t aged well
Review by semrix ★½

Every Woody Allen film is about adultry & it gets very tiring after a while.
Also (and not surprisingly), Woody dating a schoolgirl has not aged well. Who’d’ve thunk it. Only managed to get all the way through on the 3rd watch
Review by Mohamed Albsekri ★★★★½

فلم وودي الن فيه بيدوفيلي وبيطبل ل بيرجمان وفليني وبيقرا كتب نخبوية
و ميرل ستريب ليزبيان