Whatever Works

Whatever Works centres on Boris Yellnikoff, a sharp-tongued, pessimistic New Yorker who has withdrawn from a successful career and a comfortable life into a more bohemian existence. His routine is interrupted when Melody, a young runaway from Mississippi, turns up at his door, hungry and with nowhere to go. He lets her stay temporarily; she soon moves in, and the mismatched pair drift into a relationship and then a marriage that surprises them both. Their arrangement is upended by the arrival of Melody's conservative southern parents, whose visit draws Boris's friends and former lovers into a tangle of romantic complications.

Woody Allen directed and wrote the film, the thirty-seventh of the forty-eight features he has directed, following Vicky Cristina Barcelona and preceding You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger. Larry David plays Boris and Evan Rachel Wood plays Melody, with Patricia Clarkson, Ed Begley Jr., Michael McKean and Conleth Hill among the credited cast of twenty-four. Produced by Letty Aronson and Stephen Tenenbaum for Wild Bunch, Gravier Productions and Perdido Productions, the film cost about 15 million dollars and took roughly 36 million dollars worldwide.

On TMDB it holds 7.1 out of 10 from 1,885 votes, while the critics' rating stands at 5.5 out of 10 from 169 reviews, so audiences have responded considerably more warmly than reviewers.