Zelig
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
|
Related e |
|
Featured: |
Zelig is a 1983 American mockumentary film written and directed by Woody Allen and starring Allen and Mia Farrow. Allen plays Leonard Zelig, a nondescript enigma, who, apparently out of his desire to fit in and be liked, unwittingly takes on the characteristics of strong personalities around him. The film, presented as a documentary, recounts his period of intense celebrity in the 1920s, including analyses by contemporary intellectuals.
The film was nominated for numerous awards, including the Academy Awards for Best Cinematography and Costume Design. It was well received by critics, receiving a 100% rating on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.
Style
Zelig was photographed and narrated in the style of 1920s black-and-white newsreels, which are interwoven with archival footage from the era and re-enactments of real historical events. Color segments from the present day include interviews of real and fictional personages, including Saul Bellow and Susan Sontag.
Plot
Set in the 1920s and 1930s, the film concerns Leonard Zelig (Woody Allen), a nondescript man who has the ability to transform his appearance to that of the people who surround him. He is first observed at a party by F. Scott Fitzgerald, who notes that Zelig related to the affluent guests in a refined Boston accent and shared their Republican sympathies, but while in the kitchen with the servants, he adopted a coarser tone and seemed to be more of a Democrat. He soon gains international fame as a "human chameleon".
Interviewed in one of the witness shots, Bruno Bettelheim makes the following comment:
- The question of whether Zelig was a psychotic or merely extremely neurotic was a question that was endlessly discussed among his doctors. Now I myself felt his feelings were really not all that different from the normal, what one would call the well-adjusted, normal person, only carried to an extreme degree, to an extreme extent. I myself felt that one could really think of him as the ultimate conformist.
Dr. Eudora Fletcher (Mia Farrow) is a psychiatrist who wants to help Zelig with this strange disorder when he is admitted to her hospital. Through the use of hypnotism, she discovers Zelig yearns for approval so strongly that he physically changes to fit in with those around him. Dr. Fletcher eventually cures Zelig of his compulsion to assimilate, but goes too far in the other direction; for a brief period he is so intolerant of others' opinions that he gets into a brawl over whether or not it is a nice day.
Dr. Fletcher realizes that she is falling in love with Zelig. Because of the media coverage of the case, both patient and doctor become part of the popular culture of their time. However, fame is the main cause of their division. Numerous women claim that he married and impregnated them, causing a public scandal. The same society that made Zelig a hero destroys him.
Zelig's illness returns, and he tries to fit in once more, before he disappears. Dr. Fletcher finds him in Germany working with the Nazis before the outbreak of World War II. Together they escape, as Zelig uses his ability to imitate one more time, mimicking Fletcher's piloting skills and flying them back home across the Atlantic upside down. They eventually return to America, where they are proclaimed heroes and marry to live full happy lives.
Cast
- Woody Allen - Leonard Zelig
- Mia Farrow - Dr. Eudora Nesbitt Fletcher
- Patrick Horgan - Narrator
- Ellen Garrison - Older Eudora Fletcher
- Stephanie Farrow - Meryl Fletcher
- Elizabeth Rothschild - Older Meryl Fletcher
- Mary Louise Wilson - Ruth Zelig
- Sol Lomita - Martin Geist
- John Rothman - Paul Deghuee
- Sherman Loud - Older Paul Deghuee
- Deborah Rush - Lita Fox
- Garrett Brown - Actor Zelig
- Marianne Tatum - Actress Fletcher
- Will Holt - Rally Chancellor
- Peter McRobbie - Workers Rally Speaker
With Susan Sontag, Irving Howe, Saul Bellow, Bricktop, Dr. Bruno Bettelheim, and Professor John Morton Blum as themselves.
