Rifkin's Festival

Possibly more clever than outrightly funny, Woody Allen's charming RIFKIN'S FESTIVAL stars Wallace Shawn as a geeky film studies teacher who's attending the San Sebastian Film Festival with his wife (Gina Gershon), who's a publicist. As in his STARDUST MEMORIES, Allen shows he has little interest in box office, press conferences, fake glitz, and the self-anointed. While Shawn trudges around the festival which promotes, in his opinion, garbage, he re-casts the situations in which he finds himself in scenes from his favorite films (but with the actors in this film). So we see these 4:3 B&W inserts of films by Truffaut, Bergman, Bunuel, Godard, Fellini, and a funny CITIZEN KANE bit. Oy vey! Not as star studded as in days of yore, but some familiar faces show up, including Christoph Waltz as Death, Steve Guttenberg and Tammy Blanchard as Rifkin's brother and his wife, Richard Kind as Rifkin's father. We also get Elena Anaya as the doctor, Louis Garrel as the "star," and Douglas McGrath as Gil. And Wallace Shawn does well as Woody's alter-ego, but he can't deliver a line or a joke with Woody's aplomb.

Well, to be frank and honest about Woody Allen, his works are never to be expected of delivering a destination, more like a journey on a piece of a road from nowhere in particular to nowhere in particular , just the story telling of the journey. Its not bad though , sometimes its quite joyful.

Full of quotes from old movies and this one is very cool, but beyond that the movie has no bite. Really really flat film that deals with the theme of love in a banal and obvious way without any twist or thing that makes it interesting. Moreover, we feel the tremendous lack of the character of Woody Allen who would have given more color to the film. But in the end it remains a good movie.

Woody Allen attempt to makes us fall in love with charming San Sebastian fails at every step of the way. He reuses his known "unhappy marriage" plots to yet again talk about how complicated it is to be in a relationship. Bland performances. Not even the city of San Sebastian saves this movie, with uninteresting photography that fails to capture any kind of uniqueness or nuance. He portrays San Sebastian as a generic coastal city with no particular interest.

Even if it's the same Woody Allen's topics of all these years, It's better than I thought. Has some dull parts in the middle, but its pace improves towards the end, specially with the acting of the lady playing doctor Jo Rojas and the crazy Sergi Lopez cameo. Rifkin's character gains some depth, too, as the movie approaches to the end. And the scene with Waltz is absolutely hilarious, maybe the only good jokes of all the movie. Loved the black & white, as well, but I keep wondering if Allen will surprise his public again with a final masterpiece. We can always hope.

Setting aside Woody's recently contaminated personal life for a moment, to fully enjoy Rifkin's Festival is surely going to be problematic, but not impossible. If you watched the accusations detailed in HBO's "Allen v. Farrow" you may already have decided to intensely hate the man. I'll leave that decision to you. So let's get this over with right now: Woody's pinnacle as a filmmaker likely ended around 30 years ago. His best work may indeed be behind him but he apparently isn't finished yet. Rifkin's Festival is about obsessing about one's own demise, and reveals multiple parodies of several well-known film classics (Citizen Kane, films by Ingmar Bergman, Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, snd Federico Fellini, etc.). These frequent "regressions" are crisply shot in black-and-white film, not color. It's a small movie with a moderately sized heart. As of May 28, 2021, Rifkin's Festival has barely grossed $768,449 in Spain and $1.8 million worldwide (Spain, the Netherlands, Ukraine, Italy and Russia). Who knows if it will ever be officially released in America and worldwide? It's not likely to be a huge money maker, but then how many previous Allen projects ever reached those improbable financial heights? Still, Rifkin's Festival resides in familiar Allen territory, and he shamelessly exploits the same weather worn recipe in this new film, which not surprisingly involves a liberal dash of marital angst lovingly blended in a glamorous and bluntly romantic Spanish setting. Is Rifkin's Festival worth watching? Of course it is. Is Allen a despicable person? Perhaps. And perhaps not. But to enjoy an artist's work, one needn't align themselves or idolize the person who created it. Viewers must judge the film itself, a work studded with biting dialogue and ironic drama. The film embraces familiar themes, which emerge early and stubbornly remain until the film's final act. For that reason alone, the film works, placing the mostly veteran cast and their motivations in the forefront, and leaving unspoken the lurid tabloid accusations to be determined to the shifting sands of time. One must review the film, not the director's allegedly controversial personal life choices. You can loath the artist and still find room in your heart for their art. Rifkin's Festival is a symbolic reminder that real life and art are often interchangeable, complicated, and sardonic. But it takes gifted writing, superb direction, and malleable actors to bring it to a recognizable acceptance. And perhaps this is the solemn (albeit overly tread) message of Rifkin's Festival and Allen's 49th film. Rifkin's Festival is subtly brought to life, capturing all that is profoundly human and flawed, but ignoring the inescapable vulnerability of life itself.

Well, suppose I was the guy over 60 or maybe even over 65, with bald head, short, out of shape and, actually as ugly as a toad or an old hippo, I couldn't imagine to have a wife like that. Furthermore, I couldn't believe there would be another young woman in Rome would fall for me (I can't type "fall in love with me", cos it's absolutely impossible!) But you know what? Woody this time replaced his own pathetic image with another guy who looked even more pathetic than him to play this Don Juan/Valentino oddball from New York again. Guys created by Woody seemed always got a 2nd chance to hit the jackpot to find some nice and young women somewhere on this planet would catch him up and madly fall in love with him. Yeah, always believe "When a door closed, another window will open", no matter how old and ugly you are, as long as you are able to keep blabbering to shoot off your mouth to prove that you're still have the energy and urge to hook up a new woman for your senior years. Hey, Woody, you continued to give many many old gizzards and goofballs hope. I can't thank you enough.

The scenery is beautiful, and there are many recognisable Woody Allen moments. However, it is not as neurotic or dialog heavy as many of his previous films. The pace is very slow. I was already pretty bored half way through the film.

Most likely to be Woody's last battle as a Director, Rifkin's Festival is Woody's 50th+ movie he has both written and directed. A legendary filmmaker equal to the likes of Ingmar Bergman, Rifkin's Festival is not only a love letter to Woody's career in cinema, but it is also a statement of appreciation for Ingmar Bergman himself. Many scenes from the movie are either a parody or pay homage to Bergman's movies. At the end of Deconstructing Harry, Woody Allen mentions a new character named Rifkin as the movie ends. Seeing this more clearly as a fan of Woody Allen, I see more an more connections to all his movies as a whole collective. This makes Rifkin's Festival the perfect movie to end Woody Allen's career as America's greatest story teller and filmmaker of humor and relationships. Wallace Shawn finally gets the starring lead in a Woody Allen film after being the supporting character multiple times. It is hard not to see his self portrayal of himself in My Dinner with Andre when he walks alone in the streets of San Sebastián. He is mirroring his isolated walk of quiet desperation equal to his misery to My Dinner with Andre. Rifkin's Festival is also a departure from the typical Woody Allen movie where an older man flaunts over a younger, muse type figure. Here, the older woman is seduced by a younger man. However, the central character's struggle with regret, writing a novel and death are still center stage. What else would you want or expect from a Woody Allen movie? In the end, it's a great movie for Woody Allen fans.

This will be our last to watch anything from Woody. His movies are extremely formulaic and repeatedly boring on small timers with older ages, mediocre or even ugly peoples; it may be inevitably related to Woody himself(?). But the most unbearable flaw of all his movies is those characters, almost everyone of them simply couldn't keep their mouths shut for awhile, they just keep blah, blah and blah with all the small talks. This movie is exactly the same, both leading male and female characters started blabbering from the very beginning. It drove us crazy after bombarded by their machine gun like shooting mouths. My wife and I both decided to give it up after 25 minutes. The other thing that turned us off was the old fart leading man, old and bald like him, Woody still wanted to give him (or himself?) a chance to fall in love with someone, as always. I don't think Cupid would waste any moment on this guy and other the other characters like him or her to sprinkle love baking powder on them.