Irrational Man
Short description
Abe Lucas is a philosophy professor who has lost any sense that his life matters. He arrives to teach for the summer at a college in a small town, and before long he becomes involved with two women: Rita Richards, a lonely colleague who hopes he will rescue her from an unhappy marriage, and Jill Pollard, his most gifted student, who grows close to him even though she has a boyfriend, Roy.
The film follows Abe as his bond with Jill pulls him out of his despair and pushes him toward a decision with consequences for everyone around him. Joaquin Phoenix plays Abe, with Emma Stone as Jill, Parker Posey as Rita and Jamie Blackley as Roy. Woody Allen directed from his own screenplay, producing with Letty Aronson, Stephen Tenenbaum and Edward Walson.
Released in July 2015, Irrational Man runs 95 minutes and mixes comedy, crime and drama, an unusual combination for its director. It is the forty-third of the forty-eight films he has directed in chronological order, coming after Magic in the Moonlight and before Café Society. Made for about 11 million dollars, it returned roughly 27 million worldwide. On IMDb it holds 6.6/10 from around 70,000 votes, and on TMDB 6.5/10 from about 2,500 votes, while critics gave it 5.7/10 across 203 reviews, so audiences have been somewhat warmer toward it than reviewers.
What's left behind the scenes
- Woody Allen's reverence for the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky is manifested in two episodes of the film. In one, Abe exclaims, "Dostoevsky was right!" (regarding views on Abe's own life), while in another, Jill finds Dostoevsky's novel "Crime and Punishment" open on Abe's table.
- The fifth and third consecutive film by Woody Allen shot in anamorphic "Cinemascope" format (aspect ratio of 2.35:1).
- Woody Allen's first film starring Joaquin Phoenix.
- The fourth Woody Allen film to explore the theme of crime and punishment. The first three were "Crimes and Misdemeanors" (1989), "Match Point" (2005), and "Cassandra's Dream" (2007).
- Joaquin Phoenix gained almost 15 kilograms before filming, firmly believing that his character should look exactly like that.
- Scenes set in a fictional university town were filmed at a real university in Newport, Rhode Island.
- The plot is based on the idea from Alfred Hitchcock's film "Strangers on a Train" (1951) – a murder committed by a random person unknown to the victim, in order to lead the investigation to a dead end in the search for a motive. As in Hitchcock’s film, part of the plot of "Irrational Man" unfolds in an amusement park.
- Sophie von Haselberg's first role in a feature film in almost a quarter of a century.
- The second consecutive film by Woody Allen to feature Emma Stone.
- To a certain extent, the film "Irrational Man" (2015) is a modern adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel "Crime and Punishment" (1866).
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