Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

RELEASED IN 2009 and written & directed by Woody Allen, "Whatever Works" concerns an aging, misanthropic divorcée in New York City (Larry David) who develops a close relationship with a much younger, unsophisticated, but sprightly Southern belle (Evan Rachel Wood). Patricia Clarkson plays her mother and Henry Cavill a guy that's interested in her. Ed Begley Jr. is on hand as her father. The first 60-70 minutes are amusing as a romantic dramedy with the typical witty dialogues for which Allen is known. The odd relationship between the curmudgeon and the spry girl is actually kind of heartwarming as the bickering gimp starts to become human again. In addition, it's interesting to see Cavill when he was younger, before he donned Superman's cape. But, for me, everything's ruined by the last act, which pushes the typical degenerate "progressive" mindset: Christians should flee their "backwards" morality and their belief in God and come to the big city where they'll discover secular freedom (actually bondage) with its supposedly superior (im)morality. Get real. THE FILM RUNS 1 hours & 33 minutes and was shot in New York City. GRADE: D+

There's something endearing about Larry David, as there was about the young Woody Allen. OK, we get the elitist hatred for anyone who isn't Woody. I suppose we can only write about things we know. He knows a certain version of New York, his self-hatred, his hatred for conservatives, and the Marx Brothers.As for story line, this one is riddled with clichés. Southerners come to New York, and find out that their inner bohemian has been waiting to come out. I would have found it more interesting if they developed a certain tolerance for New York types, but ultimately rediscovered their conviction for the things they have always believed.Evan Rachel Wood is cute in this, Larry David is himself, which is lovable, and Clarkson and Begley deliver excellent performances. The time line of how things work out is fine, and to me, the idea that we may find unconventional scenarios actually work for us, is also fine and true. Allen does show that pessimism is unappealing, and that perhaps he is jealous of the sunny optimism of Southerners and others like them. But ultimately he makes all the characters embrace his worldview. So he doesn't really take chances.

Woody Allen goes the "romantic comedy for people who hate romantic comedies" route with 2009's Whatever Works, a quirky and challenging comedy that provides solid entertainment, thanks to an extremely likable leading character who is absolutely not written that way and some interesting supporting characters who provide constant surprises.Writer/comedian Larry David gets a shot at leading man status as Boris, the original grumpy old man, a former physicist and intellectual, who hates everyone and everything, angry at the world, and determined to inhabit it by himself...think Ebeneezer Scrooge without the money. Boris finds his life changed by Melody (Evan Rachel Wood), a runaway from Mississippi who Boris takes in and what begins as a Pygmalion kind of relationship actually morphs into a marriage. Things get stickier with the arrival of Melody's mother (Patricia Clarkson), a contemporary reincarnation of Blanche DuBois, who tries to break up her daughter's marriage and discovers a new person inside of herself in the process.As always, the real star of this film is the Woodmeister's script, which is angry and no-holds barred, offering unpopular opinions on every aspect of pop culture and politics that you can imagine, but also offers a relationship at the center of the storm that is just really hard to swallow...Melody's attraction to Boris is a mystery because other than a razor sharp mind, Boris has no redeeming qualities and actually marrying the man almost threw me off the film altogether. I was also troubled by the character of Melody herself...the character appears to be a total hayseed when we first meet her, but she soaks up everything Boris teachers her and remembers every single word that he ever taught her, even if she doesn't always remember what it means.We've seen a lot of actors channel Woody over the years and some worked better than others (John Cusack in Bullets Over Broadway and Kenneth Branaugh in Celebrity were standouts), but no one did it better than Larry David does here...David is comfortable with this unappealing character and his performance alone makes this film worth investing in. He especially seems to enjoy when Woody allows him to break the fourth wall and talk to directly to the camera, a technique which is not groundbreaking but leave it to Woody to take it to another level and let us all in on the joke. Wood is a talented actress but the inconsistencies in her character made it difficult to invest in her performance, but I loved Patricia Clarkson as her mother, a character who goes through an entertaining transformation, another staple of Woody's writing, one character who goes through a significant change and Clarkson appears to be having a ball.Woody's attention to production values is flawless as always...special nod to the set designer (Boris' apartment is awesome) and cinematographer Harris Savides photographs Woody's beloved New York with loving care and of course the music is wonderful, have always loved Woody's ear for music, but this movie is worth checking out for Woody's challenging script and direction and for his choice of a very unconventional leading man that pays off in spades.

In "Manhattan", Woody Allen's character broke up with his girlfriend, a young student played by Mariel Hemingway. Despite reasonable arguments, her reaction showed that she genuinely cared for him, and it was such a devastating moment we didn't even care about their age gap. At the end, he realized he made a mistake, when confronting her again, she told him to have more faith in people. He got the message and smiled, if it's meant to work again, it will.Three decades later, "Whatever Works", conveyed a similar message within an unlikely couple: Boris (Larry David) and Melody (Evan Rachel Wood), Boris is probably 20 years older than Allen in "Manhattan" but there's no moral condemnation of any sort in the film whose title almost works as an alibi. "Whatever Works" is an invitation to free our mind from moral, social or religious prohibitions in the name of happiness. So not to be too cynical, as long as Melody was 21, it could work. But not without conditions, whatever was driving Melody's attraction toward Boris, it just had to be "good reasons" from our standpoint, were they?Melody grew up in a dysfunctional family with an overbearing God-fearing mother and a straight- laced yet unfaithful father, so she jumped at the first man who would be the perfect antithesis to the only adult models she had in her life: a quantum physics expert and an intellectual malcontent. Love is all about filling gaps, and the way the characters evolve in the film shows that one's only happy when he filled the right gap. Take the father (Ed Begley Jr.), he raised a family to hide a latent homosexuality, once he admitted it, he knew exactly what was missing in his life and so he was happy. Boris filled a temporary gap in Melody's life.The purpose of these two persons being together might seem ridiculous but "Whatever Works" puts the whole concept of 'ridiculous' into perspective. Something that seems preposterous or unacceptable for a character becomes a new standard of life and a source of intellectual or emotional blooming later. Yes, Boris can't stop bragging about his superior intellect or complaining about the superficiality and pointlessness of life, but maybe Melody was going through a phase where it had a positive effect on her, whatever works. If Melody's mother (Patricia Clarkson) wants enjoys a "ménage à trois", why should her daughter restrict her own sentimental area to a specific demographic group?It sounds rational to have Melody with one her age, but you can't reason with a film whose main protagonist committed suicide because he couldn't stand the perfection of his previous wife. Boris is such a complex character that his lack of appeal can't be reduced to the 'age' factor, the man is simply misusing his intelligence by being totally disillusioned about life and hostile toward any human being who can't reach his almighty mind, even throwing chess pieces on children he calls "inchworms". With Melody, he can't do the usual shtick because she admits his "superiority", so, the poor guy is disarmed. And coming from a cheerful and adorably naive little creature, well, if not his heart, Boris' ego couldn't say 'no'. Then they marry, he starts to appreciate her company, until she becomes indispensable to his own well-being. It's very revealing that in the second act, he starts smiling more and being kinder to her, the other side of the coin is that she also grew some maturity, enough to be able to think for herself and question her choices. Melody then understands she lived with Boris as a reaction to her past, and that move is typical from girls of her age. He was brilliant within his own grouchiness and she felt "completed" by that intellect she could plagiarize on his absence, with more or less credibility. But even by supposing they had to cancel their marriage, I wish it had been done differently.When the film started, I didn't know where it was going exactly, yet the story was absorbing in a way I just stopped caring and wanted to embrace the film's unpredictability with fun and enthusiasm. As ludicrous as it seemed that the two would marry, I was ready to accept it. Why should an old curmudgeon like Boris have an adorable and loving wife like Melody? Well, to every "Why", there's a "Why not"? Then the mother came and did her best to wreck the marriage, without even letting her daughter make the choice by herself, and even when she adopted a more free-spirited lifestyle, she was still trying to put that Randy James in the arms of Melody. That it worked, and easily, was a kind of letdown to me. I felt cheated.Good old Hollywood again, the whole film has been such a hymn to unconventional happiness that there was something frustratingly cliché about the pretty young couple. And when she had to tell the truth to Boris, he had that face that was saying "who am I kidding?". Melody had good reasons to leave him, but I wish it was because of a personal choice, not because she met your average handsome smooth talker, and certainly not her mother's protégé. At least, Boris has always been sincere with her, Randy gave his best shot, brought her to his boat, gave her wine, pretended stuff, it's not like he didn't exploit some of her naivety.All was well that ended well for everybody, and even Boris seemed to have found a soul-mate after a second suicide, but I wish there was 'a catch' with the medium or some punchline, not just a last- minute heart-filler. And I wish Melody had dumped Randy to enjoy her new independence, deserving more than the guy sent by her mother, another guy, another girl, two guys, or one of Boris' age for irony's sake, anything that would have called for 'whatever works' as a conclusion.