Café Society

Although synonymous with contemporary Manhattan brownstone bohemia, director Woody Allen here heads into the past to indulge his affection for the swinging Los Angeles of the 1930s. Jesse Eisenberg stars as Bobby Dorfman, a young New Yorker who, unwilling to follow in the family trade, heads west to Hollywood to work for his uncle Phil (Steve Carell), a major talent agent. Bobby falls for Phil's PA, Vonnie (Kristen Stewart), aware that she has a lover but unaware of the consequences of pursuing her. As is common for a latter-day Allen production, the set-up is light and fun. LA is made luminous by Vittorio Storaro's magnificent camerawork. The plot, however, mostly treads water, finally taking Bobby back to New York, where his gangster brother orchestrates his rise as a club-runner in high society. Unusually for Allen, whose films mostly wrap up crisply at around the 90-minute mark, things simply trundle to a close, ending on a morose note of arty ambiguity that smacks of indecision more than intent.