Everyone Says I Love You (1996)

Directed by: Woody Allen | 97 minutes | comedy, romance, musical | Actors: Edward Norton, Drew Barrymore, Diva Gray, Ami Almendral, Madeline Balmaceda, Vivian Cherry, Tommie Baxter, Jeff DeRocker, Cherylyn Jones, Tina Paul, Vikki Schnurr, Natasha Lyonne, Kevin Hagan, Alan Alda, Gaby Hoffmann, Natalie Portman, Lukas Haas, Trude Klein, Goldie Hawn, Itzhak Perlman, Pamela Everett, Navah Perlman, Barbara Hollander, Julia Roberts, Waltrudis Buck, Patrick Cranshaw, Isiah Whitlock Jr., Woody Allen, Tim Roth, Billy Crudup, David Ogden Stiers

You don’t have to be a film analyst to recognize the nostalgic sentiment in Woody Allen’s work. The stories are often told together by a voice over, always in the past tense and often in the form of legends. Movies such as ‘Radio Days’, ‘Broadway Danny Rose’ and ‘Sweet and Lowdown’ are just dripping with nostalgia and longing for the past. In the mid-90s, if anyone still doubts Allen’s nostalgic nature, his most surprising production of that decade immediately puts an end to it. With Everyone Says I Love You, Allen returns to the musicals of Hollywood’s golden age. And gets away with it too.

‘Everyone Says I Love You’ tells a timeless story, about loves that move towards and away from each other, with the characters bursting into song at all times. The songs are from a bygone era (with the center of gravity around 1930), but fit well with the events on screen and the feelings of the characters. Allen often uses a classical structure: a doctor in a hospital starts a song, nurses join in, during the instrumental break doctors, nurses and patients dance a happy dance and we end with a collective singing.

Although ‘Everyone Says I Love You’ has its typical Allen traits – humor, hilarious dialogues, name dropping, the chaotic family as the cornerstone of society – the special genre provides special elements. Because romance predominates, the story is set not only in New York but also in Paris and Venice. That Allen chooses real Hollywood stars (Julia Roberts, Natalie Portman, Goldie Hawn) is not his habit, but here too he follows the musical makers of yesteryear.

All the actors sing their own songs. That is not always pleasing to the ear, but it gives the film a relaxed and cheerful tone. The fact that the film is not entirely free of irony – a creepy criminal bursts into a sweet love song, the beautiful Julia Robers sings about the slightly less beautiful Woody Allen – does not detract from the respect for the musicals of the past. Seeing Woody Allen jogging and singing himself might be asking a bit too much for the unprepared viewer.

Yet ‘Everyone Says I Love You’ is a gamble that exceeds expectations. The film is non-committal and superficial and the story never goes anywhere, but that doesn’t bother this musical. The film never pretends to be more than an ode to romance and an ode to Hollywood bygone. And succeeds with flying colors.