Woody Allen is deeply fascinated and affronted by the reign of jargon. Sociologists who write about the death of the word in America must have tin ears; American wits at the moment have the antennae for details of cliché that the English have for details of vernacular. In "Bananas," which is slightly about revolution in a banana republic, the plot is ropy and can seem flailingly right-wing when it probably thinks and means something reforming; the one-liners therefore run out of steam halfway through the picture, and too many scenes tend to come out on a bit of l'esprit de l'escalier when they would work better if the person on the staircase would shut up, but the film really is funny about automated language. (pp. 127-28)
But still, for all the odd glories of the film, it has to be said that the Castro jokes are often miles out of control, that the blackout lines get lame, and perhaps that the use of a comic personality dependent on being humbly distraught and henpecked may be holding back this wit from the soaring and fearless lunacy that he can sometimes flight to. (pp. 128-29)
Penelope Gilliatt, "Woody Allen," in The New Yorker (© 1971 by The New Yorker Magazine, Inc.), Vol. XLVII, No. 13, May 15, 1971, pp. 127-29.
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