Top critical review
2.0 out of 5 starsNot all Woody Allen movies have to be funny but they should be something. Anything!
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 30, 2013
If you are a committed Woody Allen fan and determined to have a complete collection I suppose that is adequate excuse to buy Celebrity. If you are seeking complete collections of Kenneth Branagh or Judy Davis movies or movies by any number of the actors who appear, walk on or cameo in this movie then you have an excuse to buy Celebrity. If you're looking for an evening's entertainment do not read further, do not get this movie, do not rent this movie. It's just not worth it.
Kenneth Branagh is a brilliant actor and more than capable director. One can almost see him eager to be an actor in a movie written and directed by Woody Allen. No doubt some of the other stars were looking for some Woody Allen magic and perhaps a chance to appear in a movie with each other. Speaking as a Woody Allen fan I can't think of any reason to condemn a general viewing audience to a showing of this movie.
Somehow we're supposed to believe that Kenneth Branagh playing another one of the neurotic New York stuttering fumbling male comedic characters is a former star high school athlete recently divorced from another neurotic New York female Judy Davis/Annie Hall retread. About one third of this movie consists of these two characters being neurotic and inhibited and recently divorced from each other. The ex-husband Lee Simon is of course incompetent on a heroic scale and we are told is simply unlucky in love. The ex-wife Robin Simon goes almost directly from the marriage bed into the arms of a man who will not only loves her idiosyncrasies but turns them into what we are led to believe will be a successful television career.
What saves this movie from a single star rating is that between being aggravated by an otherwise nothing new central plot device is a parade of clever to superior acting performances from people like Melanie Griffith, Winona Ryder, Leonardo DiCaprio and Babe Neuwirth.
There is some yammering about a culture that's lost its values and people who are famous for being famous and so on. There is no new ground being broken here. Ultimately we have two caricatures we have seen too many times from Woody Allen. They've lost their charm and here they are quite aggravating. This is a movie with a few comedic moments some pretense of philosophy and I don't know a partridge in a pear tree or something. Other than its value to collectors I can not imagine who the intended audience might be. I cannot recommend this movie.
