Rent Alice (1990)

Comedy of middle age. - Alice review by Steve

 One of Woody's attempts at magic realism is a comic revision of Another Woman. A rich, materialistic wife and mother (Mia Farrow) enters middle age and begins to review her childhood, her past choices, and her present circumstances (particularly the marriage to a very unfaithful high roller played by William Hurt) and throws away all the privilege to work for charity.

She is aided in her self discovery by the herbs of a wise Chinese doctor who enables her to transform her reality in order to mend her heart. So she  can become invisible, fly over Manhattan and meet the ghost of a former love.

 There is a problem at the heart of Alice. Either Mia doesn't have the energy and charisma to carry so much of the film's focus, or Woody needed to write a more substantial character at its core. With such a conspicuous vacuum its other weaknesses become apparent, like a couple of repetitions from earlier films and a nagging feeling that the suffering of the poor of Kolkata is exploited rather to illustrate the first world problems of a rich Manhattanite. And it feels a bit stretched.

Still, it has a few good laughs and it's a cute idea. The film successfully lampoons the vacuous privilege of  its cast of super-rich New Yorkers and their frivolous frippery. I finished the film however wondering if it might have been improved with Judy Davis in the lead rather than her insubstantial cameo as Mia's new squeeze's ex wife.