Product Details

• Actors: Caroline Aaron, Kirstie Alley, Bob Balaban, Richard Benjamin, Eric Bogosian
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Letterboxed, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: English
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: New Line Home Video
• VHS Release Date: November 3, 1998
• Run Time: 96 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (107 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 0780623975
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #183,062 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Woody Allen roared back at his detractors with Deconstructing Harry, a bitterly funny treatise about the creative process. Known to mine his often tumultuous personal life for his movies, the embattled writer-director-star didn't bother to make his alter ego likable in this movie: Harry Block (Allen) pops pills, frequents prostitutes, and cheats on the women in his life, then writes about their foibles in thinly disguised fiction. No wonder they're all furious with him. As Harry journeys to his alma mater with a hooker, ill pal, and kidnapped son, a series of flashbacks unravel, juxtaposing Harry's relationships with their "slightly exaggerated" fictional counterparts. There are amusing cameos throughout, including a humorous turn by Demi Moore as a fictitious ex-wife who "became Jewish with a vengeance," and Billy Crystal as the devil who found Hollywood too nasty for his liking. The humor is dark and caustic, but well worth it; Deconstructing Harry is a near-brilliant mediation on the sometimes queasy relationship between art, creator, and critic. --Diane Garrett

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Woodman in the Raw. Great Stuff. A bit strong., May 17, 2005

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B. Marold "Bruce W. Marold" (Bethlehem, PA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Deconstructing Harry (DVD)

`Deconstructing Harry', written and directed by Woody Allen, may set the record for famous name cameos in Allen's pictures, with the added twist that you have famous actors playing the parts of other famous name actors in the same movie, as when, for example, Kirsty Ally, one of the Allen character wives, is played by Demi Moore in a playing out of one of the pieces of fiction represented in the movie.

I have often touted the virtue of rewatchability in almost all of Allen's movies. After all, why buy a DVD or tape of a movie if there is no value in watching it more than once. With this movie, it is absolutely essential that you watch it at least three times to understand what is going on, as the movie freely, and with relatively little warning, switches back and forth between cinema reality and Harry's (the Allen character) fiction. In some movies, having trouble keeping track of the plot threads means this is simply a bad movie. There are things in this movie that may have been done poorly, but the parallel thread lines between reality and fiction is not one of them.

This is certainly one of Allen's two or three most highly biographical movies, the others being `Stardust Memories' and `Radio Days'. It is not even a big stretch to make the Allen surrogate character a writer rather than a film maker (as in `Stardust Memories') since Allen did a lot of short story writing for the `New Yorker' before film making took all of his time. All of Allen's favorite subjects, primarily love, sex, death, Judaism, parents, and creativity are here. Books have been written about the themes in Allen's movies. `Deconstructing Harry' could easily take a book or at least a long monograph in itself to explicate all the ideas going on in the real and fictional threads.

Allen even brings in parodies of classic fiction in his references to both Dante's `Divine Comedy' and Milton's `Paradise Lost'. For good measure, there is a short riff on Bergman's grim reaper character in a reprise from his appearance in `Love and Death'. I will not give Allen too much credit for such an obscure reference, but his visit to Hell (borrowed from Greek mythology) makes Hell seem almost like a fun place to be, even for the damned, if the damned subjects happen to have a yen for a little sweaty bondage. The reference I speak of is to the etched illustrations of Dante's `Inferno' done, I believe by a 19th century artist which provided a lot of guilty pleasures as an adolescent in the grownup library stacks.

While this movie is a thoroughly Woody Allen piece, I did get some sense that more than a little influence from Kevin Smith seems to have crept into the dialogue, as the frequency of strong four letter words is dramatically higher than in any other Allen movie. This is improbable, as Smith's first movie, `Clerks' I think just came out shortly before the release of `Deconstructing Harry'. But, the cuss a minute dialogue does remind one of Smith's favorite character, Jay of `Jay and Silent Bob' fame.

The quality of the filming and editing in this movie makes one wonder whether some of the sloppy transitions within and between scenes were not intentional. One can easily imagine that the shooting schedule was such that you only had Robin Williams or Richard Benjamin or Demi Moore or Billy Crystal for a day or a half a day, so if you didn't get perfect shots of them on that day, Allen and his editor possibly did the best they could with what they had. There is a kind of choppyness I simply have never seen in any of Allen's movies before or since this one. One thing which makes me think this obviously choppy editing is intentional is the opening scene behind the credits where the Judy Davis character is seen repeatedly leaving her cab at Harry's apartment in order to beat on him for including their marriage in his latest published piece of fiction. The differences in the 5 or 6 times this sequence is shown are almost random, parodying, in a way, the opening to `Manhattan' where the Allen character's voice over is working through various drafts of an opening line to a piece of fiction. So, instead of literally quoting `Manhattan', Allen shows multiple attempts at editing the same scene. Another intentional effect that suggests the choppy editing is intentional is the riff that makes the actor character played by Robin Williams to literally go out of focus.

The story is really not quite as neat as the two other biographical movies, even though `Stardust Memories' does contain a lot of ambiguity between the cinematic and the real. It is also clearly not as polished as most of his other movies, especially the high gloss works such as `Crimes and Misdemeanors' and `Hannah and Her Sisters'. In some ways, it has the same manic quality of his very early movies such as `Take the Money and Run' and `Bananas'.

And yet, it is easily one of the most interesting about which to spin theories on Allen's sources and his messages. I would only recommend this movie to someone who is fond of Allen's movies already. I would certainly not recommend it to anyone who has never seen or never liked a Woody Allen movie. But, for the faithful, this is pure gold, and funny to boot!

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Journey to hell with your inner demons, July 26, 2005

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milss "Yellow hair warrior" (Planet Earth) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Deconstructing Harry (DVD)

In a rare case of art imitating life, Woody Allen gives us his comedy Deconstructing Harry, where we meet Harry Block, a neurotic writer unfaithful to all of his wives, addict to sedatives, obsessed with sex and prostitutes; a man who shamelessly offends family members and friends with his books. In a jiff, a classic Woody Allen character, but darker, sadder, more isolated and more immature.
Now, on the verge of a famous University tribute, Harry must deal with his insecurities, bad habits and nerves while he begins a journey where he will interact with dual realities -the ones in his agitated life and the ones reflected through the characters of his books- and will show the audience with very black humor his incapacity to have honest relationships and his absurd excuses to defend his nasty actions. He will revolve in the deepest caves of his destructive side until literally go to hell, as never had done an Allen's character
To recommend Deconstructing Harry implies to warn you that you`ll be part of a sordid world of phobias, obsessions, fear of death, hypochondrias and neurosis, all of this wrapped up with a coat of vulgarity and repulsiveness that won't run out through the 96 minutes of the film.
It's a respectable, intelligent, witty and crude work. Here, Allen has consumed himself as an irreverent. Honest and brutal, he gives us a stellar cast with colorful characters, with Harry as the center of everything. The dialogs are quick, witty, full of cynicism, and will get as many laughs as many stomach kicks. But let's appreciate his honesty, not criticize it.
It's inevitable not to compare Allen's life and personality with his Harry: his ability to create memorable and valuable works, in spite of the scandals surrounding his life, his personality, a little neurotic and lonely. "Why can't I function in life I only function in art"...His willingness to use himself as a joke, his toughness with himself is a hit in Deconstructing Harry, even when it brings him near to self-destruction.
Allen`s creative genius and his talent as a filmmaker once again are here on the top. Just like Harry, Allen's life has been full of chaos and scandals, but he has proved, if anyone had a doubt, to be an exceptional artist. And that's the only thing that should matter to the audience.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Woody Allen travels into the mind of a writer, excellent!, November 17, 2000

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Jeffery K. Matheus (Indianapolis, IN United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Deconstructing Harry (DVD)

How can I best describe the story of Woody Allen's 1997 comedy "Deconstructing Harry"? Well, I think that the film does a great job of describing itself with some of the final words of dialogue that we hear spoken by Allen's on-screen protaganist Harry Block, "It's about a really interesting character, a guy who can't function well in life, but can only function in art". This is not the first or last time that Allen has taken on the subject of creative personalities in his work, look at the jazz musician in "Sweet and Lowdown", the playwright in "Bullets Over Broadway", or the documentary fimmaker in "Crimes and Misdemeanors". But with "Deconstructing Harry" Allen seems to be at both his most self-revealing AND self-conscience as he tackles the life of a popular (but unhappy) novelist who is experiencing writers block, as well as those close to him who he has literally "used" in his work. It also seems like Allen was in a particularly dark and pessimistic mood when he concieved this piece (as opposed to say, the romanticism of "Manhattan" or "Annie Hall"), but luckily for us that pessimism translates into some hilarious darkly-comic moments. I must say that personally, I love this film and consider it among Allen's best work ever,...but I gaurantee you, it will NOT be for everybody! This film has an unusally complex style of storytelling, even by Woody Allen standards. We see Harry's life and work unfold through flashbacks, scenes from his novels, fantasy sequences, and most interestingly, conversations with the imaginary characters that he has created. Some viewers may also be turned-off by Woody's excessive use of jump-cuts in this film, as dialogue is sometimes cut off in mid-sentence, and scenes jump from one image to another. However, some words spoken by Harry towards the end of the film about his "fragmented, disjointed existence" (as the on-screen picture runs through a series of quick jump cuts), seem to be an attempt by Allen to actually EXPLAIN the film's choppy style to his viewers. I remember that when some people went to see this film in the theater (including a certain big-time movie critic!) they got completely swamped by it's unpredicable, free-wheeling narrative, but for those who are used to Allen's unique brand of storytelling will probably find it to be quite fascinating! It would be amiss of me not to mention Allen's excellent supporting cast. Elisabeth Shue (looking particularly gorgeous here!) is a sheer delight as Harry's much-younger love interest, and their brief scenes together add s real spark to the film, Judy Davis has some great scenes as a neurotic kook ex-lover who has been hurt by Harry's all-too-true work, and TV actress Kirstie Alley almost steals the show as Harry's bitter ex-wife, and a flashback to the literal END of their marriage is one of the films best moments. Allen and Alley are both exceptional in what must be the most hilarious marital argument scene ever put on film! Harry's wimpy backpeddling and self-justification when caught in an exra-marital affair is a classic Woody Allen moment! This film may not be for everyone, but for those who "get it", "Deconstructing Harry" is a great cinema experience!