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Martin Landau, Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, Alan Alda, Anjelica Huston ... see more see more... , Jerry Orbach , Sam Waterston , Joanna Gleason , Caroline Aaron , Claire Bloom , Stephanie Roth , Jenny Nichols , David S. Howard , Anna Berger , Victor Argo , Martin Bergmann , Hy Anzell , Robin Bartlett , Bill Bernstein , Merv Bloch , Thomas Bolster , Frances Conroy , Gregg Edelman , Joel Fogel , Sol Frieder , Zina Jasper , Sylvia Kauders , Dolores Sutton , Jerry Zaks , Justin Zaremby , Nora Ephron , Warren Vache , Kenny Vance , Donna Castellano , Thomas P. Crow , Randy Aaron Fink , Barry Finkel , Steve Maidment , Chester Malinowski , George Mason , Stanley Reichman , Nadia Sanford , Rebecca Schull , Garrett Simowitz , Marvin Terban , Grace Zimmerman , Rabbi Joel Zion , Derek Smith

Woody Allen spent most of the 1980s and '90s veering between comedy and drama, and he rarely combined the two with greater success than in Crimes and Misdemeanors, in which he weaved together two stor... read more read more...ies, one deadly serious, one often funny, both ending in sadness. Martin Landau plays Dr. Judah Rosenthal, a prominent ophthalmologist with a successful practice, a loving family, and a reputation for generous charity work. But Rosenthal also has a secret: his mistress, Dolores (Anjelica Huston). What began as a casual fling has become uncomfortably intimate, and as he tries to break off the relationship, Dolores threatens to expose his infidelity to his wife and some unorthodox financial arrangements to his colleagues. Fearful that Dolores will make good on her threats, Judah confesses his secret to his brother Jack (Jerry Orbach), who has ties to organized crime and offers to "make the problem go away." Meanwhile, Cliff Stern (Woody Allen) is a filmmaker working on his pet project, a documentary about philosopher Prof. Louis Levy (Martin Bergmann). However, films about philosophers don't pay the rent, so Cliff's wife Wendy (Joanna Gleason) arranges for him to make a documentary for public television about her brother Lester (Alan Alda), a famous TV comedian whose vapidity is exceeded only by his arrogance. While Cliff tries to bite the bullet and finish the film, he finds himself falling in love with PBS producer Halley Reed (Mia Farrow). ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

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90% liked it

21,705 ratings

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92% liked it

38 critics

PG-13, 1 hr. 44 min.

Directed by: Woody Allen

Release Date: October 13, 1989

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DVD Release Date: June 5, 2001

Stats: 1,214 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (1,214)

  • moonrivers
    April 27, 2012
    moonrivers
    "Sleeper" was and has been my favorite Allen film, always light, breezy and fun, but I haven't seen them all and now this dark rumination forces me to alter my original opinion. The acceptance here of dark forces roaming the void is unavoidable and comedy becomes ... disposable,... read more or at best only momentary in a sea of sadness. Must see for Allen fans.
  • spielberg00
    February 5, 2012
    spielberg00
    Woody Allen has taken the exhausting drama we are used to seeing when we turn on drippy television programs, and used those as a device for satire. We get examples of just what he is poking fun at when his character takes relatives of his to the movies. In such scenes, we see and... read more hear snippets of black-and-white melodramas with strikingly similar plots to the one in this film itself. Only Woody Allen could have made such a film.
  • FrizzDrop
    January 18, 2012
    FrizzDrop
    Somehow this Woody Allen film truly surprised me. There wasn't something I could outright point to and use as an exact example, but this film isn't the conventional Allen film and maybe not a conventional film on its own. Though Allen would later try to fuse comedy and drama with... read more his film Melinda and Melinda, he failed in many ways to be poignant with the drama and anything except quirky with the comedy. This film separates the two stories by keeping it between two completely different people and storylines. I think the reason so many people embrace this while not identifying with the bevy of his other work, is that it doesn't always fall into the obscurity category. Allen always makes his films about people and their morals, the way they throw them away for love, money, dreams or keep them and suffer. He recycles plots and characters with ease and that irks some people. This film cannot be replicated, mostly because of the tour de force performance from Martin Landau. Completely unrecognizable from his Oscar winning performance in Ed Wood, Landau is an oddly subtle yet extraordinary character, who lies easily enough to his wife and children while keeping company with an overly dramatic mistress (Huston) who has a dangerous wish to upend his life and reveal his frivolous affair to his do gooder wife. On the other end of the spectrum is Allen's character who is trying to get out of his platonic marriage and is hurt by the actions of a woman he loves but who is spending her time with a man he personally reviles. Much of the comedy belongs to the way Allen's character satirizes Lester (Alda) in a documentary he is making. Alda acts as a pretentious comedic genius who doesn't like being shown in a negative light, and seduces every woman with his fame and greasy persona. Alda is by far the greatest presence in the film and the loudest, while still letting Allen be the grieving martyr. Really, it's not that either storyline is better or less equal to one another, it's that they work so well together to form a film that wrenches a decent emotional response while still relaying the message that all crimes are punished and no evil goes unburdened throughout people's lives, while also showing the comedy in neurotic people's desperation when other people's crimes interfere with their happiness. It's so hauntingly good and yet unspecific that I can take so many meanings from this and be happy with them all. Love this Allen film more than many others.
  • SirPant
    August 26, 2011
    SirPant
    Crimes and Misdemeanours threw me a little. It's not exactly the laugh out loud comedy I'd been lead to believe it was. That's the thing with Woody Allen films though, they are comedies of sorts but just because he's associated, doesn't always mean you'll laugh! That said, the fe... read morew times I tittered were due to his lines, some of them are classics, but all in all, I enjoyed the profound but simple message, even though it did at times feel like just another 80's TV film. I love 80's made for TV films though, and to be fair that isn't giving it the credit it deserves - I digress, Crimes and Misdemeanours is a great slice of late 80's/early 90's nostalgia, a great example of how comedy and tragedy go hand in hand, masterfully painted by Woody Allen, a genes in his own right. If you don't like him, you won't like it, if you do, you may like it more than most of his.
  • fb619846742
    July 28, 2011
    fb619846742
    A fascinating mash-up of two completely different stories, one considering a family man (Martin Landau) trying to literally bury an extramarital affair he had earlier in his life, while another story concerns a film-maker (Woody Allen) who falls in love with a TV producer (Mia Fa... read morerrow) while he is filming a documentary about a self-centered comedian (Alan Alda). It takes a brave, unique director to combine two completely different stories into one film, and somehow give some cohesion to the final product. Unsurprisingly, Allen is that man, as he is not only able to get the tones of each story exactly right, he makes us care for the characters involved thanks to some riveting dialogue sessions and a nice dose of philosophical discussion. Definitely one of Woody's best films.
  • DragonEyeMorrison
    May 5, 2011
    DragonEyeMorrison
    "A stranger defecated over my sister."
  • lewiskendell
    April 2, 2011
    lewiskendell
    "Whether it's the Old Testament or Shakespeare, murder will out."

    Crimes & Misdemeanors is not one of my favorite Woody Allen films. It's a deeply philosophical and clearly very personal story on his part, but it just didn't do much for me.

    I found it lacking in wit and couldn... read more't get involved in any aspect of the story. It's like a less compelling version of A Serious Man, blended with a more dull version of Manhattan and a helping of Allen's lingering childhood issues from being raised in a religious family and then leaving that path to follow his own way of looking at the universe. Not a pleasing combination, in my opinion.
  • kenstachnik
    March 3, 2011
    kenstachnik
    One of Allen's best dramedies. Great performances all round.
  • flixsterman
    November 26, 2010
    flixsterman
    Woody Allen's existential dark comedy about the intertwinings of love and marriage and morality. More than just a platform for gags and innuendos, Crimes and Misdemeanors is about choices and decisions and conclusions. Very intellectual, even for a Woody Allen film.
  • bottcorecords1
    April 2, 2010
    bottcorecords1
    Woody Allen makes a Coen brothers film, which resembles a cross between Manhattan and A Serious Man (or perhaps even Blood Simple). The plot is woven together in a manner that blends Allen's previous comedies with a more esoteric style of narration, especially in the way he spri... read morenkles symbolism in at the perfect moments. An opthamologist (Martin Landau) is having an affair with a woman (Anjelica Huston) who wants to reveal the whole thing to his wife. She is constantly hounding him like the voice of his conscience. He decides to go to his nefarious brother (Jerry Orbach) with his underworld connections to see what he can do to help. One of the opthamologist's patients is a rabbi who's losing his sight. The rabbi's brother Lester (Alan Alda) is a big time television producer who's having a PBS documentary made about his life. He asks his nebbish brother-in-law, Cliff (Woody Allen), who's an aspiring film-maker himself, to do the documentary, not because he respects his work but soley as a favor to his sister (because he feels sorry for her, having married such a bum). Cliff can't stands Lester, and takes to mocking him behind his back with the PBS producer (Mia Farrow). The two strike up a friendship, and Cliff starts contemplating leaving his wife for this woman. The storylines between the opthamologist and the film-maker rarely intersect, but they seem to parallel each other in other ways. They've both made mistakes with their lives and take a chance on correcting those mistakes, and neither one is really happy with the outcome. At best, they come to terms with it, and justify their own misery. I've read that this film is about showing the weakness of God, that if God sits back and watches us do the wrong thing, doesn't that make him our accomplice? Or at the very least, he just doesn't care. No justice is meted out from above on the wicked, the only guilt or innocence one experiences comes from within. It's definitely one of the best films of all time.

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Critic Reviews

Jonathan Rosenbaum
February 12, 2008
Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader

The overall 'philosophical' thrust -- that good guys finish last and that crime does pay -- is designed to make the audience feel very wise, but none of the characters or ideas is allowed to develop b... Full Review

Variety Staff
February 12, 2008
Variety Staff, Variety

The structural and stylistic conceit is that when Landau is onscreen, the film is dead serious, even solemn, while Allen's own appearance onscreen signals hilarious satire and priceless one-liners. Full Review

Vincent Canby
May 20, 2003
Vincent Canby, New York Times

The movie's secret strength -- its structure, really -- comes from the truth of the dozens and dozens of particular details through which it arrives at its own very hesitant, not especially comforting... Full Review

Roger Ebert
January 1, 2000
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

The movie generates the best kind of suspense, because it's not about what will happen to people -- it's about what decisions they will reach. Full Review

Rita Kempley
January 1, 2000
Rita Kempley, Washington Post

A relative of Hannah and Her Sisters in its duplex structure and of The Purple Rose of Cairo in its bitter theme, Crimes is two movies in one, a blend of Allen's satiric and pretentious dramatic styles. Full Review

Dennis Schwartz
March 29, 2010
Dennis Schwartz, Ozus' World Movie Reviews

Using the paper-thin lead characters as symbols to show how blind people are about themselves and their relationships has little gravitas, but the comedy is stinging. Full Review

February 12, 2008
Film4

The result is a frighteningly intelligent, and often hilariously funny whole. Full Review

February 12, 2008
TV Guide's Movie Guide

Allen's expertise is evident everywhere. Full Review

Geoff Andrew
February 9, 2006
Geoff Andrew, Time Out

Dramatically, the film seldom fulfils its promise, and its pessimistic 'moral' -- that good and evil do not always meet with their just deserts -- looks contrived and hollow. Intriguing and patchily e... Full Review

Pablo Villaca
February 7, 2006
Pablo Villaca, Cinema em Cena

Um discurso filosófico-religioso sobre moralidade e culpa que, por incrível que pareça, não apenas comove como também nos faz rir de maneira surpreendente.

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Facts

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    • Cliff Stern: The last time I was inside a woman was when I visited the Statue of Liberty. [Woody Allen describing his sex life]
    • Judah Rosenthal: Without God the world is a cesspool.
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Crimes and Misdemeanors Trivia

  • This man was nominated for a best supporting actor Oscar in three films: Tucker (1989), Crimes and Misdemeanors (1990), and finally Ed Wood (1994), his only win, for playing Bela Lugosi.  Answer »
  • Sam Waterson and Jerry Orbach starred together in the TV series Law and Order. They also both appeared in which Woody Allen film?  Answer »
  • Identify the director from the following films: Match Point Annie Hall Manhattan Crimes and Misdemeanors Melinda and Melinda  Answer »
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