Anything Else is a 2003 American romantic comedy film written and directed by Woody Allen, produced by his sister Letty Aronson, and starring Jason Biggs, Christina Ricci, Allen, Stockard Channing, Danny DeVito, Jimmy Fallon, Erica Leerhsen and KaDee Strickland. The film was shown as the opening night selection at the 60th annual Venice International Film Festival.
Anything Else | |
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Theatrical release poster | |
Directed by | Woody Allen |
Produced by | Letty Aronson |
Written by | Woody Allen |
Starring |
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Narrated by | Jason Biggs |
Cinematography | Darius Khondji |
Edited by | Alisa Lepselter |
Distributed by | DreamWorks Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 108 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $18 million |
Box office | $13,585,075 |
Screenplay
Jerry Falk (Biggs), an aspiring writer living in New York City, has a girlfriend, Brooke (Strickland). He falls in love with Amanda (Ricci) and begins an affair. After listening to exaggerated excuses for his behavior, Brooke dumps him. Jerry turns to an aging, struggling artist (Allen) who acts as his mentor, which includes trying to help sort out Jerry’s romantic life.
- Jason Biggs as Jerry Falk; a shy, aspiring writer who struggles to keep a relationship with his girlfriend, Amanda.
- Christina Ricci as Amanda Chase - Jerry's toxic, needy, insecure, indecisive, vindictive, and neurotic girlfriend.
- Woody Allen as David Dobel - Becomes Jerry's surrogate father figure after his relationship flops.
- Stockard Channing as Paula Chase, Amanda's idealistic mother
- Danny DeVito as Harvey Wexler - He works with Jerry. He is irascible and doesn't seem to be good at his job.
- Jimmy Fallon as Bob
- Erica Leerhsen as Connie
- KaDee Strickland as Brooke
- Adrian Grenier as Ray Polito
- David Conrad as Dr. Phil Reed
The film received mixed reviews from critics. Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a score of 40%, based on reviews from 129 critics. Metacritic gave the film an average score of 43 out of 100, based on reviews from 37 critics.
Leonard Maltin, in his movie and video guide, gave the film a "BOMB" rating (the only Allen-directed film he ever rated BOMB), and called it "Allen's all-time worst".
In August 2009, it was cited by Quentin Tarantino as one of his favorite 20 films since 1992, when his career as a filmmaker began.
In 2016 film critics Robbie Collin and Tim Robey ranked Anything Else as one of the worst movies by Woody Allen.