Hall Pass

Here's a piece in The Hollywood Reporter by Miriam Bale on how she'll never watch a new Woody Allen film again.

In the recent rush of sexual harassment (and worse) cases coming to light, Allen is starting to get some unwanted attention.  He's been in trouble in the past for certain things he's done, but by and large his audience (though I'm not sure about the audience at large) has looked the other way.

But the question is do we want to boycott artists and others who do things we don't like, or did things in the past we don't like.  Everyone's got to decide this for themselves, but in general I don't believe you should boycott too easily. (From a purely selfish standpoint, not everyone can live up to your standards, so if you stay away, who are you punishing?)

The article isn't that well-written or reasoned, but Bale goes way too far near the end, when she brings up one of Woody's favorite co-stars:

I want a world in which Diane Keaton doesn't need a Woody Allen to get across her style and humor, to win an Academy Award.  Because aren't the best Allen films--Annie Hall, Sleeper, Manhattan Murder Mystery--actually Diane Keaton movies?

No, they're not. (And why Manhattan Murder Mystery? Why not Love And Death?  Or Manhattan, for that matter--or does the plot of that film remind you too much of...you know.) Woody wrote, directed and starred in them.  Certainly Keaton added a lot, but she's been in many other films and none of them were remotely like her work with Woody.

So you may not like that Woody made them, but you can't wish that fact away.  If you can't face that, I'm not sure if you're ready to deal with the overall situation.