September is best known as the movie Woody Allen made twice, bang on top of each other, and still brought in on time and on budget. He decided the casting wasn't working, switched some actors and roles, and altogether dumped Sam Shepard (who subsequently had very uncomplimentary things to say about Allen as a director of actors). That was some kind of achievement and said reams about Allen's efficiency and adaptability as a filmmaker. Unhappily, the congratulations end there, for September is the single most excruciating viewing experience the Woodman ever invited audiences to share.
You could say September is Interiors without the laughs (joke: there are no laughs in Interiors either), without the pull of the Hamptons shore outside the windows, and without the chill, elegant eye of Gordon Willis behind the camera. Members of a thoroughly unappealing family convene for a weekend in Vermont. Over the course of it, almost everybody reveals a lurking preference to have a new significant other in his or her life. You will not care who, how, or why, or acquire any insights into the mysteries of human relationships. Just as Maureen Stapleton brought the breath of life to the emotionally stunted mollusks in Interiors, so here Elaine Stritch injects some sting as Mia Farrow's irrepressibly bitchy mother. The other cast members are Sam Waterston, Dianne Wiest (fresh from her Hannah and Her Sisters Oscar®), Denholm Elliott, and Jack Warden. Them you may sympathize with, for theirs is a thankless task. --Richard T. Jameson
2.
In a serene Vermont country house, six people share their dreams, their fears, and their desires, as secrets are revealed and trusts broken. The cast is led by Mia Farrow, who plays Lane, a woman who has never fully dealt with a long-ago shooting. Elaine Stritch plays Diane, Lane's mother, who never stops talking about her wild past spent with movie stars and gangsters; she is married to Lloyd (Jack Warden), a physicist with a gloomy view of the future of the universe. Sam Waterston plays Peter, a divorced writer wanna-be who loves Stephanie (Dianne Wiest), Lane's married best friend. Finally, Denholm Elliott plays Howard, the older and wiser professor who is coming to terms with his feelings for Lane. Writer-director Woody Allen's SEPTEMBER is a mature, grim, serious film, close in theme and pacing to INTERIORS, very different from such spirited romantic comedies as ANNIE HALL and HANNAH AND HER SISTERS.
3.
"Fine and brave! Allen's touch for drama has gotten warmer and surer!" -Los Angeles Times
A shuttered, claustrophobic drama about six unhappy people trying to verbalize their feelings in a dark summer house in Vermont.
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