Mighty Aphrodite

Starring:F. Murray Abraham, Claire Bloom, Helena Bonham Carter, Olympia Dukakis, Karin Haidorfer, Yvette Hawkins, Jeffrey Kurland, Jimmy McQuaid, Rosemary Murphy, Steven Randazzo, Michael Rapaport, Tucker Robin, J. Smith-Cameron, Mira Sorvino, David Ogden Stiers, Donald Symington, Nolan Tuffey, Jack Warden, Peter Weller
Studio: Miramax
Product Type: DVD

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Mira Sorvino won an Oscar for her performance as a bubbleheaded hooker and porn star who happens to be the mother of a bright young boy adopted by a Manhattan couple (Woody Allen and Helena Bonham Carter). The story finds Allen's sportswriter character becoming curious about the identity of his son's biological mom, and he strikes up a relationship with her without revealing why. This 27th feature written and directed by Allen is a nice combination of smart comedy and some of the wackier energy of his earliest movies. (Between scenes, there's a running gag involving a Greek chorus--actually filmed among some real Greek ruins--who do song-and-dance interpretations of the script's events.) This isn't Allen at his best, but it is a fine minor work graced by Sorvino's spin on the cinema's archetypal dumb blonde. --Tom Keogh

Description

From Oscar(R)-winning writer-director Woody Allen, MIGHTY APHRODITE is a hilarious, romantic comedy set in contemporary New York. "One of the best comedies of the year!" (The Boston Globe) "Mira Sorvino is wonderful!" (Roger Ebert)

Customer Reviews:

One of the Best Later Comedies.......2007-04-26

It's easy to break Woody's directing career into three phases. Early career, which would be the seventies movies with Diane Keaton. The mid-career phase was the eighties and early-nineties, including all of the films with Mia Farrow. And late career would be everything after that, up through the latest films with Scarlett Johansson.

Of the later films, this one is often considered the best--though you could certainly make a case for "Deconstructing Harry," or even "Sweet and Lowdown." This one is certainly the best of his later films that might be called a straight comedy.

Woody's experimented with almost every type of movie: slap stick (Bananas), musical (Everyone Says I Love you), fake biopic (Zelig), Fellini inspired (Stardust Memories), Bergman inspired (Another woman), whodunnit (Manhattan Murder Mystery), etc, etc, etc. On this one he found something truly inspired--he blended the elements of Greek tragedy with a Woody Allen comedy--and it worked.

The story here doesn't have the layers of a film like "Hannah and Her Sisters." It's a comedy about a couple who adopt a child. Woody plays the father, and he becomes obsessed with learning about the child's real mother. After building her up in his mind, he's let down to discover she's a call girl, so he takes it upon himself to make her life better, and comedy ensues.

Mira Sorvino won an Oscar for her role, and there is good supporting performances from F. Murray Abraham and Helena Bonham Carter, but what really makes this movie is the idea of a Greek Chorus narrating the tale and gradually taking a larger role then you'll ever find in "Oedipus" as they become more and more involved in Allen's decision making. The movie even ends with the Greek element of a deux ex machina.

Like most of Allen's movies, this may not appeal to everyone, but if you're a fan then you will really enjoy this movie and you need to see it.

Greek tragedy was never this funny.......2007-03-01

This is the last hilarious movie made by Woody. He adopts a kid and the kid turns out to be very bright, so Woody goes on a quest to find the birth mother. Woody is at his peak, my only complaint was Mirs's voice, I heard her speak before and it wasen't this annoying. Other than that you could do a lot worse comedy wise. Enjoy!

Awful movie...ditto on "WHAT WAS THE ACADEMY THINKING?!".......2006-10-21

So this was the breakout movie for Mira Sorvino, the one that earned her an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1995.

This movie, and Mira Sorvino's performance in it, was so bad that after it was over, I just had to find out who her competitors were for the 1995 Best Supporting Actress category.

Let's see.....according to Wikipedia they were: Kathleen Quinlin ("Apollo 13" - a fairly standard worried-wife-of-astronaut-in-danger role), Mare Winningham ("Georgia" - did not see this one), Joan Allen ("Nixon" - did not see, but how hard can it be to play the wooden Pat Nixon?), and Kate Winslet ("Sense and Sensibilities" - did not see either, but Ang Lee was robbed by the Academy here also).

It only proves just how few good roles there are for women in today's Hollywood that Mira Sorvino could win an Oscar for this sort of performance.

And I was beginning to warm up to her, too - she was great in "Romy and Michele's High School Reunion", and terrific also in "Beautiful Girls".

So, what exactly is so bad about this movie? Here's a brief list:

1. Mira Sorvino plays the entire movie in a high-pitched falsetto that sounds like her voice is breaking. Another reviewer described this as similar to listening to fingernails on a blackboard. Maybe in 1995, because she was new, the Academy didn't realize that this wasn't her real voice and took pity on her....

2. Stupid plot device of the Greek Chorus.

3. Stupid happy ending with a twist.

4. Lots of profanity and dialogue that includes explicit descriptions of sex acts done in pornography movies.....while this movie is not itself a porn flick, the explicit details of the porn industry included in the dialogue definitely makes it NOT a movie for families to watch.

5. Odd sight of a very old and wrinkly Woody Allen (with dyed hair and bald spot) making out with TWO women young enough to be his granddaughters.....all right, so I'm just jealous - Woody still looks gross....

6. Cliched, poorly developed characters, a plotline that goes around in circles, and lots and lots of pointless, unfunny dialogue.

In summary, this movie is bad, bad, bad......

Woody's Last Excellent Comedy.......2006-07-09

Here it is. The last really 100% enjoyable, insightful Woody Allen movie. Allen deftly mixes and matches classical greek tragedy with common vulgar pornography & prostitution. Sort of his way of identifying the thin line between comedy and tragedy in so much of life. Allen is fascinated by the absurd & the grotesque. He's also fascinated by the profound & the beautiful. Most of all, he's fascinated by how life embodies so many contradictions. Sometimes simultaneously. Mira Sorvino is wonderful as a basically decent lady who happens to be a hooker and adult actres and Allen is his usual goofy neurotic mess.

Allen at his best!.......2006-04-17

Woody Allen's movies fit together perfectly like jigsaw puzzles, well and evenly scripted, excellent casts (even better when Allen's in them), funny comments, interesting plots, plausible endings. I loved this flick, just watched it, had seen it before and loved it then too. I recalled there being more vulgarity in it than there was, and would have liked it, but it earned it's R rating proudly. It was interesting (all his movies are to me), funny as hell and had a snappy twist of an ending. In fact a perfect ending. I don't remember liking the Greek chorus the 1st time I saw it, but I loved it this time, it filled in the gaps, fleshed out the movie and was funny. In fact, the whole thing was funny. Movies like this are why I watch so much Woody Allen.

Charlie Rose with Jimmy Breslin; Mira Sorvino (September 19, 1996)

Average customer rating:

Charlie Rose with Jimmy Breslin; Mira Sorvino (September 19, 1996)

Manufacturer: Charlie Rose
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

( C ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video

Description

Pulitzer Prize winning newspaper columnist Jimmy Breslin discusses his book, I Want to Thank My Brain for Remembering Me, which recounts two years prior, when doctors found he had a brain aneurysm in the very area of the brain that controlled his writing skills. After, Academy Award-winning actress Mira Sorvino talks about her new film, Sweet Nothing, in which she plays a Bronx housewife whose life unravels when her husband turns to drugs.

Charlie Rose with Mira Sorvino; Gwyneth Paltrow & Doug McGrath (December 6,1996)

Average customer rating:

Charlie Rose with Mira Sorvino; Gwyneth Paltrow & Doug McGrath (December 6,1996)

Manufacturer: Charlie Rose
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

( C ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video

Description

Academy Award-winning actress Mira Sorvino speaks about her Oscar win for her role in the film Mighty Aphrodite, attending Harvard University and her new movie Sweet Nothing. Then, At the Lowell Hotel in New York Charlie speaks with actress Gwyneth Paltrow and her director Doug McGrath about her new movie, a film adaptation of the Jane Austen novel Emma