As perfect as escapist movies get

 THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO (1984)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

The movies have always been a gateway to escape to another world, an escape from real-life problems. The rich irony to Woody Allen's "The Purple Rose of Cairo" is that the escape from real-life is a gateway to real-life, to the acceptance that real life is nothing like the movies. That is the special and wonderful charm of one of Woody Allen's greatest films. 

The Great Depression has made everyone poor ("The whole country's out of work") yet Cecilia (Mia Farrow), a newly hired waitress at the local diner, is always dreaming of the movies and sees one every week at the local theater. Her boisterous brute of an unemployed, flirtatious husband, Monk (Danny Aiello), plays craps and seemingly refuses to work ("I went to the ice factory and there's nothing there"). Cecilia has to make ends meet and get good tips but before long, she becomes unemployed. So she goes to the movies to escape from her depressing world to see the latest Hollywood programmer, "The Purple Rose of Cairo." This is a movie about the super wealthy (in the 1930's, people needed that kind of escape from the world - who the heck knew anybody who was wealthy?) and a naive explorer/archaeologist wearing a pith helmet at every function, including glamorous parties. He's Tom Baxter of the Chicago Baxters (Jeff Daniels) and the flickering movie persona notices that Cecilia is seeing this movie every day. Yep, think of this as a glorious update of "Sherlock Jr." except this Tom Baxter is no Buster Keaton - he is a man in love with Cecilia. This causes a ruckus as he steps off the screen and the movie-within-the-movie stops short of continuing its story. Cecilia teaches Tom everything about real life such as movie money is not real money, that you can't live on love, there are no fade outs during a kiss and that cars just can't start without an ignition key! There is also a bordello scene that is possibly one of the sweetest bordello scenes ever seen, if that seems possible.

"Purple Rose of Cairo" could have floated beautifully with this impossible romance on its own yet Allen complicates things. Gil Shepherd (also played by Jeff Daniels) is the Hollywood actor who comes this small NJ town to convince "his creation" to get back on the screen. Easier said than done. To make things even more complicated, Gil falls in love with Cecilia and buys her a ukulele. Is this love with Gil for real, or is the blooming romance between the fictional Tom and Cecilia more real?

"The Purple Rose of Cairo" is a cinematic jewel, a truly remarkable comedy sprinkled with enough real drama dust to pass as one of Woody's most perfect films. Pure joy is evident in every frame. Every performance, every Depression-era period detail, every piece of music so suffuses every scene that it flows like a dream one that doesn't want to end. That's the movies, folks, but maybe not real life! Cecilia learns that painful lesson.