Scoop (2006)

The movie runs out of plot and jokes well before the end of a two-hour running time, long for a light comedy.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Wow, Scarlett Johansson is so beautiful. I love her attempt at Woody-type shtick, even though she may be too young to totally understand the gimmick, or the art I should say, Scarlett really goes for it and she's so cute doing it. So, so cute...I love Scarlett Johansson. I hardly notice Woody when I watch Scoop. I hear him. Hugh Jackman's very nice and he gives a convincing portrayal as the killer. Scoop has the right idea, with its...God, I love Scarlett in glasses! When she removes her glasses, then disrobes into her red swimsuit and dips in the pool with Hugh then pretends to drown then Hugh rescues her pulling her to the poolside then Scarlett thanks Hugh and apologizes then she EMERGES OUT OF THE POOL LIKE A GLISTENING VOLUPTUOUSLY BOSOMED AND BODIED AQUATIC GODDESS!! then Scarlett stretches out her crampy leg and introduces herself to Hugh, she's...uhhhhhh...what...Scarlett.........incredibly sensually pleasurable on a level that I did not understand until I watched it so closely just now. This is like Scarlett's hottest scene, omgoodness. Scarlett is the dream girl. Nice work, Woody, I totally love Miss Johansson and care about her character in this delightfully energetic whimsical tale with its twist and wonderful familiar score. Trust me, this is a really good film. Scarlett's lovely in Scoop really.

An American journalism student in London (Scarlett Jo) gets the scoop on a big story, and begins an affair with an English aristocrat who just may be a serial killer Director: Woody Allen Writer: Woody Allen image1.jpegWoody's 2005 followup to last year's Xlnt Match Point Just came from seeing the latest Woody Allen-Scarlett Jo collaboration, "SCOOP". Well, he musta scooped this one up from the bottom of the barrel. Light fare, to say the least -- lighter than air on a Sunday afternoon in the Arizona desert. Scarlet --well, yeah --she's easy to look at, but she better look beyond Allen if she wants to get serious about her career. Jack Hughsome --or wuzzit Hugh Jackoff -- Good looking Aussie chap, but little or no screen charisma -- Woody obviously threw this plot together just so he could spend more time following Johansson's lovely little rump around the set for a few weeks. Supposedly a comedy, but I didn't find it very funny, and, except for the one scene with Scarlett in a skin-tight one-piece bathing suit emerging from a swimming pool -- pretty boring -- but, okay -- she's easy on the eyes. The film was so flimsy it was like Chinese takeout in the Jewish neighborhood -- fills you up for five minutes, then you're hungry again -- I actually felt so unsatisfied that I wanted to stay and see a real movie right afterward, but it was too late --as the Pushkin Theater was letting out for the night.

Woody Allen doesn't make bad films. At his best he makes films that are absolute treasures of the filmmaking craft, made all the more memorable by the writer/director's sonorous one-liners and punchy zingers. He can also make films that are strikingly ordinary; held together only by a few frivolous if easily relatable quibbles and the charm of its cast. Scoop is not one of Woody Allen's finer films. In-fact despite hosting the effervescent charm of Scarlett Johansson as its lead, it's barely even passable.The story begins with former journalist Joe Strombel (McShane) standing along the shores of the river Styx with death himself. He strikes up a conversation with Jane (Woolgar) a recently deceased secretary who swears she had her coffee poisoned by her boss. She's convinced her employer Peter Lyman (Jackman) is the "Tarot Card Killer," who has been terrorizing the citizens of London for months. Enter journalism student Sondra Pransky (Johansson), a good girl from Brooklyn who takes in a magic show hosted by bargain-bin magician Sid Waterman (Allen). While volunteering for one of Sid's chintzier tricks, she accidentally summons the spirit of Joe whom may have the biggest tip she's ever received.Woody's reaction to the box office returns of Irrational Man (2015) By the sounds of it, Scoop has all the familiar trappings of your average Woody Allen gig; an ensemble falling in and out of love, working- class insecurities played against a backdrop of high-class social circles, the inevitable specter of death played for laughs. Adding in the convoluted plot of murder and betrayal and a fine performance by Hugh Jackman, Scoop had a story to rival Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993). Unfortunately due to two big glaring errors, Scoop remains relegated to the Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001) pile.The first error was casting the rapturous Scarlett Johansson as the endearingly classless Sondra Pransky. The very name conjures a Midwestern milk-maiden thus the character calls for being charming in her own pedestrian flightiness; She talks of being Katharine Hepburn sure, but she's ultimately the type of girl who one could easily talk to and share your secrets. Far be it for me to limit the range of Ms. Johansson. She has played the femme fatale and the permissive interloper to great aplomb in Match Point (2005) Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) respectively, yet ordinary she certainly is not. Not even a masters course in at the Sorbonne and Monster (2003)-style makeup could have made her blend to the degree Allen needed her to.The other problem is Allen himself whose still pulls the same shtick that's served him well since the days of the 1960's late-night talk show circuit. It still works but as a vessel for quick quips and erudite wordplay, Woody Allen the man looks like dotty old man clinging to his comedic career like the Great Calvero. Are we truly meant to believe that Sid Waterman's tired magic show is enough to warrant Ricky Jay level audience attendance? Even in his prime, Allen had the stage presence of a salamander newt. In may ways that was part of his charm.Yet beneath a few casting missteps there is still a good story to be told. Allen aptly balances the more morose themes with a light touch proving that even at his worst he can mix the bleakness of Ingmar Bergman with the absurdity of a David Ives. And you can tell by the subtle visual motifs that Allen still has a sharp cinematic literacy, calling back to classics like Suspicion (1941) and A Place in the Sun (1951).Woody Allen doesn't make bad films. I write this knowing that as an unabashed fan and completest, I will one day have to sit through Anything Else (2003). Yet if anyone is more deserving of a pass it's Woody Allen. He's made a feature film every year since 1969; most of which are not only good but award worthy. Scoop won't win any awards and certainly won't be anyone's favorite but with a breezy and fun little story, at least it's not a total failure.

Pretty awful. Probably the worst movie of Woody Allen's career. I fully accept that Woody Allen is a creep in real life, but I try to separate the art from the artist, and it's hard to deny that Woody Allen has made many excellent movies. This is not one of them. Scarlett Johansson is very pretty. That is all you can say about Scarlett Johansson. She is a terrible actress and always has been and probably always will be. Woody Allen as an actor, at this point in his career, is beyond annoying--let's hope he just stays off the screen from now on.The rest of the cast is pretty stilted too. The jokes are lame and lifeless. The story is OK. If you must see all of Allen's movies, you'll have to see this no doubt, but if you miss it, you're not missing much.