Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)

Between two Thanksgivings, Hannah's husband falls in love with her sister Lee, while her hypochondriac ex-husband rekindles his relationship with her sister Holly.

Director:

Woody Allen

Writer:

Woody Allen

Stars:

Barbara Hershey, Michael Caine, Mia Farrow

Won 3 Oscars. Another 26 wins & 20 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Barbara Hershey	...	Lee
Carrie Fisher	...	April
Michael Caine	...	Elliot
Mia Farrow	...	Hannah
Dianne Wiest	...	Holly
Maureen O'Sullivan	...	Norma
Lloyd Nolan	...	Evan
Max von Sydow	...	Frederick (as Max Von Sydow)
Woody Allen	...	Mickey
Lewis Black	...	Paul
Julia Louis-Dreyfus	...	Mary
Christian Clemenson	...	Larry
Julie Kavner	...	Gail
J.T. Walsh	...	Ed Smythe
John Turturro	...	Writer

Storyline

During a Thanksgiving Day party we make aquaintance with a numerous and problematic family. The leading characters are three sisters: Lee, the woman of Frederick, an old misanthrope painter; Holly, who dreams of becoming a writer, or an actress, or who knows who...; Hannah, famous actress, beautiful, intelligent, good mother, good wife, good sister, in short perfect, the pivot of the family. The balance begins to break up when Hannah's husband, Elliot, falls in love with Lee, who leaves Frederick. Holly goes through a deep crisis and meets Mickey, the former husband of Hannah, a hipocondriac TV producer. The affairs evolve and at the last Thanksgiving ...

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Plot Keywords:

thanksgiving | actress | painter | hypochondriac | writer | 

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Genres:

Comedy | Drama

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Certificate:

PG-13

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

7 February 1986 (USA)

Also Known As:

Hannah y sus hermanas

Filming Locations:

5th Avenue, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$6,400,000 (estimated)

Gross:

$40,084,041 (USA)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Orion Pictures Corporation, Jack Rollins & Charles H. Joffe Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

103 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Lewis Black and Joanna Gleason's film debuts.

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Goofs

Dolly tracks are visible when the camera pulls back in the living room.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Elliot: God, she's beautiful. She's got the prettiest eyes. She looks so sexy in that sweater. I just want to be alone with her and hold her and kiss her and tell her how much I love her and take care of her. Stop it you idiot, she's your wife's sister. But I can't help it. I'm consumed by her. It's been months now. I dream about her, I - I - I think about her at the office. Oh Lee, what am I gonna do? I hear myself moaning over you and it's disgusting. Before, when she squeezed past me at...

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Connections

Featured in The 44th Annual Golden Globe Awards (1987)

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Soundtracks

"If I Had You"
by Jimmy Campbell, Reginald Connelly (as Reg Connelly) & Ted Shapiro
Performed by Roy Eldridge

User Reviews

One of Allen's best films and definitely his best performance...

"Hannah and Her Sisters" is a comedy/drama (though mostly drama) about a dozen characters and their stories, all connecting back to three sisters: Hannah (Mia Farrow), Lee (Barbara Hershey) and Holly (Dianne Wiest). Hannah is the favorite, talented and kind, Lee is almost equally favored, but Holly is the outcast, with a past of drugs and always asking for money. Other characters include Hannah's hypochondriac ex-husband Mickey (Woody Allen), her current husband Elliot (Michael Caine), Lee's boyfriend Frederic (Max von Sydow) and Holly's friend April (Carrie Fisher).

Like I said before, this is not so much a comedy as it is a drama. The comedy that's in it fits, and is good, but the drama is better. Elliot's secret love for Lee is handled in a romantic way, but their infidelity is still seen as wrong, and you feel their guilt and inner turmoil. Mickey thinks he has a brain tumor, he finds out he doesn't and then he feels worse, and starts desperately searching for a purpose to live. All the other stories are equally dramatic, with comedy fittingly sprinkled in places too.

The acting is quite good, everyone playing their part perfectly, whether it's big or small. The film's best performances come from Allen (in what's no doubt his best performance) and Dianne Wiest as the extremely under-confident youngest sister. Allen and Wiest don't necessarily carry the film, as there's no need to, but their segments were certainly the best, for me at least. The rest of the cast put forward too, especially Max von Sydow and Michael Caine in his first (and so far his only deserving) Oscar win.

Woody Allen's direction is at the top of its form here too, much like "Annie Hall" and his other greats. The camera work and use of voice overs are excellent. For instance, there is an intensely dramatic scene where the three sisters have lunch together and for the entire scene the camera rotates around the table, the speaker not always in the frame. His script is great too, it knows when to be dramatic and when to be funny and when to be both.

One of Allen's very best, 8/10.