Love and Death: Into the Archive

 

Love and Death (1975) is considered the last of Woody Allen’s “early, funny ones,” a comedic breakdown of classic Russian literature and, of course, the themes of love and death. It follows the adventures of self-proclaimed coward and poet Boris Grushenko (Woody Allen) and his pursuit of his distant cousin Sonja (Diane Keaton) through the ups and downs of the Napoleonic Wars. Despite constant visions of the Grim Reaper and encounters on the battlefield and in a duel, Boris survives to marry Sonja, only to have their lives interrupted by France’s invasion of Russia. The two conceive an ill-advised plan to assassinate Napoleon and stop the war, but it ends up with Boris captured and facing the firing squad at dawn. Throughout the film Woody Allen pricks all the grim, intense pretensions surrounding love and death (especially exemplified by war and marriage) with hilarious deconstructions and all-too-literal readings, ending with a joyfully absurd dance with Death.

          An extra bonus, of course, is if you have a passing acquaintance with Russian literature (especially the works of Leo Tolstoy, Ivan Turgenev, and Fyodor Dostoevsky) and can spot the elements that are being parodied. An epitome of this shtick can be seen in a conversation between Boris and his father near the end of the film, which name-drops many famous novels and episodes by Doestoevsky:

 

          Father: Remember that nice boy next door, Raskalnikov?

Boris: Yeah?

Father: He killed two ladies.

Boris: No! What a nasty story.

Father: Bobick told it to me. He heard it from one of the Karamazov brothers.

Boris: He must have been possessed.

Father: Well, he was a raw youth.

Boris: Raw youth? He was an idiot.

Father: And he acted insulted and injured.

Boris: I hear he was a gambler.

Father: You know, he could be your double?

Boris: Really? (strokes his chin) How novel.

 

If you want to watch a movie where War and Peace meets Borscht-belt comedy, Love and Death is the film for you, “a satire of contemporary mores, a spoof aimed more at the heart than the head!”