This is a good, solid, adult, romantic comedy that you will enjoy. How many times have you heard that Woody Allen's best work is behind him? Or that only his early work is funny? Or that he's washed up in Hollywood? Just trying to watch Woody Allen try to fudge his way into making everyone think he can still see while he is trying to direct this movie is something else. The sight gags alone, are what is worth watching this film for. There's a scene where he and Tea Leoni are going over where all the furniture is at in this hotel suite where he and Treat Williams are going to meet, that's practically up there with the old Abott and Costello routine of 'Who's on First'. I mean, really. And then there's the whole part when Woody gets to meet with Treat Williams. That whole scene was just a pure classic.Overall rating: 8 out of 10.

Woody Allen has always been a compulsive writer, but in the early 2000s it seemed he wasn't striving for making a particularly deep movie, rather for recreating the feel of his 'early funny ones' and returning to his slapstick roots. Unfortunately, 'the late funny ones' (Hollywood Ending, The Curse of the Jade Scorpion, Scoop, etc.) probably look funnier on paper than what ended up on the screen (with the exception of the outstanding Small Time Crooks). Allen does pique our interest, but he himself doesn't seem to be interested enough to really flesh out his comedic sketches.One of his most glaring mistakes in this period is that he either forces miscast actors to play his younger alter ego (John Cusack in Bullets Over Broadway or Jason Biggs in Anything Else), or he himself gives a mannered, over-acted, sub-par performance, as in The Curse of the Jade Scorpion. In Hollywood Ending, he practically demonstrates how not to play a blind man. (In my opinion, Sean Penn in Sweet & Lowdown and Kenneth Branagh in Celebrity were brilliant Woody-clones — it might have been better if one of them had returned to play Allen's role here.) The other problem with the late funny ones is the lack of balance. The plot of Jade Scorpion was thin and unfocused, yet the dialogues were witty, while in Hollywood Ending it's the other way round: the overall plot is well-developed, but the scenes themselves are boring. Instead of fleshing out his ideas, Allen's mind is already working on the next sketch to be shot and released within a year.Nearly 15 years have passed since then, but there's still no sign of Woody slowing down. Maybe he should have, but as long as he continues to make two or three truly great movies every ten years (and refrains from making such dismally awful pictures as Melinda and Melinda), I'll gladly pay the price of watching the fluff in between.

Woody Allen can get any actor he wants to be in his films because he's Woody Allen, so this film has a great cast. Tea Leoni, Treat Williams, George Hamilton to name a few. The comedy is subtle; so much so, it's almost on life-support. Allen's comedy is absurd and fun and that's entertaining, but there are only a few big laughs.The conflict: If you believe Woody's character, movie-director Val, is really worried about his career's impending demise, and that's the premise at the start, you're alone, but the suspense does kick in when Val loses his sight.Unfortunately, the psychosomatic blindness is milked through the entire movie, much to its detriment. There are two possible reasons Val goes blind: 1. He is blinded by his alienation from his son, or 2. he's blinded by his ex-wife, Ellie's (Tea Leoni) engagement to a megalomania-cal screen mogul, Hal (Treat Williams). One of these two plot-lines takes the lame-red-herring-award-of-the-decade.About the performances: Tea Leoni should have been nominated for an Oscar. She owned the film. Debra Messing, who plays Val's live-in dumb girlfriend Lori, puts on a 1940 period costume to act in Val's movie. Messing is the spitting image of Ingrid Bergman, in particular the hair-do and nose. Spooky. Treat Williams has never been better as the controlling, manipulative movie producer. George Hamilton has big laugh lines. Woody's Val is effective, but a little flat.I blinked many times because the whole movie seemed to have been filmed in a lengthy master shot. I never notice the close-ups in Woody's movies. Maybe it's the cinematography. this film is fun because there are so many wonderful characters in the frame at any one moment.

A pretty weak one-note joke film from Woody Allen during a period where he made a string of some of his most mediocre movies. It's not as bad as the following year's woeful "Anything Else," perhaps the very worst film he's ever made, but it's close.Allen plays a Hollywood director who's struck with a case of temporary blindness. You can imagine the kinds of jokes that ensue. Allen's reliance on vaudevillian humor had stopped being charming by this point and was just anachronistic. But no worries -- two years later he would experience a creative reboot and give us "Match Point," one of his best films and enough to erase movies like "Hollywood Ending" from our memories.Grade: C-