Your Movie Library
Cast
- Woody AllenLarry Lipton
- Diane KeatonCarol Lipton
- Jerry AdlerPaul House
- Alan AldaTed
- Anjelica HustonMarcia Fox
- Lynn CohenLilian House
- Melanie NorrisHelen Moss
- Zach BraffNick Lipton
- Joy BeharMarilyn
- Ron RifkinSy
- 88
ReelViews
Woody Allen is rarely a big commercial draw, and whether his off-screen antics will boost his box-office take remains to be seen, but Manhattan Murder Mystery may be his most accessible film since Hannah and Her Sisters. This movie is still pure Allen, but the humor is broad-based, and the "quirkiness" often associated with the director is kept to a minimum. Frankly, it's been years since I've enjoyed the director's work this much. - 80
Rolling Stone
Allenphiles will have a field day mining the film for inside dope. Are the clips from Shanghai and Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity — movies in which men are set up for a fall by dangerous women — a sly dig at Farrow? Better to see Manhattan Murder Mystery for what it is: Annie Hall replayed in a minor key by a filmmaker who sees the comedy, tragedy and transience of love and can’t stop playing the game. Allen’s readiness to step on a laugh in favor of feeling may cost him at the box office. But in this time of private hell and public scorn, it will help him endure. - 80
Time Out
As light and brazenly generic as Allen's early work. As a result, it is both unusually insubstantial, and, at least in the second half, extremely funny. - 80
Chicago Reader
Woody Allen's welcome return to straight-ahead entertainment, after 15 years of slogging through art-house hand-me-downs, happily coincided with a return to Diane Keaton as his leading lady, and she deftly steals the show. - 75
Chicago Sun-Times
Manhattan Murder Mystery is an accomplished balancing act. - 70
Variety
Woody Allen once described himself as "thin but fun," and the same could be said for his latest effort, Manhattan Murder Mystery. Light, insubstantial and utterly devoid of the heavier themes Allen has grappled with in most of his recent outings, this confection keeps the chuckles coming and is mainstream enough in sensibility to be a modest success. - 70
Washington Post
His new film, Manhattan Murder Mystery, isn't a knee-slapper. A comic mystery in the tradition of the "Thin Man" movies, it has effortlessly funny appeal. Almost intentionally imperfect, it's a tossed-off sketch of a thing, intended to lightly engage and no more. - 67
Austin Chronicle
Fast and funny, it makes you wish this would-be American master was more often lightweight.