I had my own moments of impatiencenwith the picture, but I am lessnviolent than I used to be and evennmellower. In a way, it was entertainingnto see Coppola’s own daughter, Sofia,nplaying the part of Michael’s daughter,nMary, who is in love with her cousinnVincent. She is awkward enough tonhave attracted a lot of comment, whichnsuggests that Coppola must have noticednher maladroitness and decided,nfor whatever reason, to leave her in thenpicture and go with whatever statementnthat gesture implied. I find myselfnwondering what it could mean — ancontempt for Paramount’s money andngreed? A way of answering back andnsigning the picture, claiming it withnsome piece of sabotage? Or are we tontake her in some larger emblematicnway, reading in her face a cue to thenOld Masters who would put themselvesnor their family members intonaltar pieces and other such public performances?nThe gesture in the directionnof opera is clearly a consciousncontrivance, to which this may be ancomplementary trope. She is nevernquite bad enough to ruin the film, butnone notices sufficiently to keep thenmovie at a slight remove from thenimmediacy the Valley Stream loutsnmight have preferred.nOi Awakenings I have relatively littlento say. The picture is worth mentioningnfor the brilliant performances ofnRobert De Niro and Robin Williams.nThe story is of the brief revival of angroup of catatonic patients on L-dopanand their relapse to near inertia. It isnobviously tear-jerker stuff, a variant onna number of earlier films (Charly, forninstance, with Cliff Robertson as thenretard who is transiently smartened up,nbut basically The Prince and the Pauper).nThe message, which is trumpetednloudly enough to suggest that PennynMarshall’s intended audience is on thenlower slope of the bell curve, is that lifenis precious and we should all be gratefulnfor the gift of each second that isnafforded to us. Crankily, I am temptednto counter that if each second is sonprecious, fewer of them should benwasted on this kind of ersatz uplift . . .nbut De Niro was so good as to makenme decide that I hadn’t wasted thentime after all. (On the other hand,nRobertson got an Oscar for his performancenin Charly.)nBy the end, when De Niro is putn50/CHRONICLESnback to bed and we see him reduced tondiapered helplessness, Robin Williams,nthe shy doctor, is finally emboldened toninvite Julie Kavner, the noble nurse, tonjoin him for a cup of coffee. Seize thengusto! Live each moment of your lifenas if it were important! Get the message?nWell, we do, and it is difficult tonkeep from giggling. One feels at such anmoment a kind of nostalgia for SofianCoppola, whose badness was at leastninteresting enough to think about.nWoody Allen’s new piece, Alice, isnalso a return to old themes and techniques.nThere are some very funnynmoments, and this is, in many ways, anlaudable film. It seems almost churlishnto complain that there used to be anbitter tang to some of Allen’s humor, anhard edge of cutting anger, and whilenthe sweetness that has replaced it innthis good-humored piece is evidencenthat Allen’s life and psyche are in goodnorder, the level of achievement is lessnlofty than what it was.nThis time around, we have MianFarrow (sounding more and more likenAllen as she reads his lines with thenhesitations and hitches he once reliednon in his own routines) as a victim ofnsurfeit. Julie Kavner comes in to do anshort turn as an interior decorator whonpresents Alice with an eel trap, an oddnoblate construction out of wicker-work,nand announces, “They’re hard toncome by,” and says, “It’s a steal at ninenthousand.” Alice seems unclear in hernreaction, and Julie Kavner advises hernto “live with it for a while.”nBut that’s exactly what she is havingntrouble doing. Her sixteen-year-longnmarriage to Doug (William Hurt) hasnturned stale and perfunctory. Alicenisn’t doing anything but shopping andnconsuming. It is the predictable midlifencrisis, and, naturally, she meets Joen(Joe Mantegna), with whom she hasnthe predictable affair. What WoodynAllen has done to enliven this is tonintroduce a bizarre Chinese herbalist.nDr. Yang, brilliantly played by KeyenLuke from the old Charlie Chan movies.nDr. Yang’s packets of herbs andnphiltres transform not only Alice’s lifenbut the film too into a version ofnLatin-American Magical Realism. Thenfantasies and dream sequences are notnnew — Allen has always embellishednhis movies with these odd riffs, wonderfulnleftovers from his days as anstand-up comedian. But their impactnnnnow is different, gentler, less driven bynpanic than by some vision of bliss.nThus, Alice and the ghost of one of hernold lovers take flight and soar, PeternPan-like, over the dreamland of nighttimenNew York, while lush strings playn”Moonlight Becomes You,” and therenare rather self-conscious beauty shotsnof the surf of Long Island. It is notnsupposed to be funny. On the contrary,nthis is meant as uplifting, andntrue, and is virtually without irony.nThere are some funny bits, andnsome nostalgic gestures to old moviemovies.nOne of the preparations of theninscrutable Dr. Yang has the effect ofnmaking the patient briefly invisible,nand Allen, Farrow, and Mantegna havengreat fun with this. At another juncture,nupset and uncertain, Alice repairsnto Dr. Yang’s shabby offices for annemergency visit, and she finds that henlives there, and indeed that, at night,nit’s an old-fashioned opium den. To seenMia Farrow, in her Peter Pan collar andnpearls, puffing away on the opium pipenand then curling up on the floor nextnto another virtually unconscious habitue,nis quite mad and splendid. Butnthat manic energy we expected fromnAllen is only evident in these quicknflashes.nAt the end, Alice goes off to thenstreets of Calcutta to join Mother Teresanin her good works (as if the purposenof the starving hordes of Calcutta werento provide spiritual opportunities fornNew York’s matrons sated by HenrynBendel). The treatment of this curiousnresolution is deliberately straight, clearlynun-ironic, for Alice then comesnhome to work with the Manhattannhomeless, and she has “real values”nand pours milk for her children!nThis dopiness comes, however, afterna brilliant piece of plotting that I resistnrevealing, a bit of business about a lovenpotion Dr. Yang has supplied that is upnthere with the best of Allen’s old work.nBut I worry about his happiness andnmellowness. It’s fine, personally, but itndoesn’t make for the zany, angry, hurt,nand puzzled brilliance of such earliernpieces as Stardust Memories. Thennew, happier, more serious Allennseems to be trying to go beyond Fellininand he is nudging up against FranknCapra.nDavid R. Slavitt is a poet and novelistnwho lives in Philadelphia.n