Once again, I am surprised by a Woody Allen movie.  Whatever it is that you think about his personal life, which is best left unmentioned, he makes some great films.  I have enjoyed the last three I have seen, including Midnight in Paris(2011), The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985), and now today’s, Café Society (2016).  He also did Anything Else (2003), which is another personal favorite.  Not all of them, though, are of the same quality.  Annie Hall (1977) is arguably the work for which he is most recognized, but I did not like that one as much as the others I have mentioned.  What they all seem to share is a difficulty with relationships.  As an idealist, I want them to be perfect, but perfection is something only found in God.  Indeed, it is something to be pursued with God, and yet never attained this side of the grave.  This means our interactions with our fellow humans are always going to be fraught with problems that, when we come down to it, are our own fault.  Allen and I would probably disagree on a great many things, but not because he is Jewish and I am a staunch Catholic.  But I am sure we would agree that love is everything, though it can be tricky, to put it mildly.  I can claim no real success, either with God or people.  At the same time, I will always put God first because He always requites.  As for others, I give you my thoughts on Café Society.

It would appear that Phil Stern (Steve Carell) is a long way from a Café Society.  As the narrator (Woody Allen) explains, the 1930s Hollywood setting in which he moves as a high-powered agent is a far remove from his humble Jewish, Manhattan roots.  Yet, that background is about to give him a reminder when he is phoned while at a party by his sister, Evelyn Dorfman (Sari Lennick).  She is making the expensive cross-country call to inform him that her son, Bobby Dorfman (Jesse Eisenberg), is coming to Los Angeles to look for a job.  Phil wants nothing to do with his nephew, brushing him off at every opportunity.  Bobby’s continued overtures mean that he becomes familiar with Phil’s secretary, Veronica “Vonnie” Sybil (Kristen Stewart).  Once Phil finally relents and offers Bobby a position as an assistant, Phil has Vonnie show Bobby around town.  Bobby is smitten with her from the start, but she holds off his advances by claiming to have a boyfriend.  This is no ploy, for she is actually seeing Phil.  Yet, as an affair since Phil is married and has a family, they have not been telling anyone.  To Bobby, Vonnie claims that Phil is a reporter who often travels.  It is the secretive nature of the romance that allows for Bobby and Vonnie to spend so much time together.  Still, Phil claims that he is in love with Vonnie, and wants to leave his wife and marry her.  When it comes time to do so, though, he finds he cannot go through with it and tells her they have to stop seeing each other.  A distraught Vonnie goes to Bobby’s place, which happens to be the same night they were supposed to have a dinner prepared by her.  Instead, she admits that her relationship is over, and this paves the way for them to start dating.  Things are going well for them, and despite the rising success he is enjoying in Hollywood, he wants to move back to New York.  He proposes that they wed and she go with him.  This looks like it is about to happen until, once again, Phil starts having second thoughts.  This is also the moment when Bobby and Phil learn by happenstance that they are in love with the same person.  It is up to Vonnie to decide between them, and she chooses Phil.  Saddened, Bobby returns to Manhattan.  Once there, he accepts a job hosting at his brother’s, Ben Dorfman (Corey Stoll), nightclub.  Ben is able to put a lot of money in it to make it a thriving business, helped by the fact that he is also a gangster.  Thus, the unassuming but charming Bobby makes the perfect front man.  It is as the maître d’hôtel that he meets Veronica Hayes (Blake Lively).  She is not divorced for long as Bobby is taken with her, and they get married shortly after she reveals she is pregnant.  With all this, he is beginning to settle into a busy but comfortable life until two things happen that nearly wreck everything.  First, Ben’s activities begin to be noticed by the authorities.  The inquiries increase when he murders Rose Dorfman’s (Jeannie Berlin), his sister, neighbor for giving her a hard time.  Ben is charged with all the usual mafia crimes and sentenced to death.  This leaves the nightclub in Bobby’s hands, and one night he gets a pair of visitors from his past.  Come on.  You had to know Phil and Vonnie would show up again, right?  Though she is a different person, it is clear that he still has feelings for her.  Phil is in New York for a few weeks on business, and it gives Bobby and Vonnie time to spend with one another.  They admit that they still think about each other, and they have a night on the town that culminates with a kiss.  It goes so far as Bobby visiting Los Angeles once more, ostensibly to explore opening a nightclub on the West Coast.  Over a meal at one of their old haunts, Vonnie says that they should probably not see each other anymore.  The last thing we see is the two of them at separate New Years’ Eve parties.  They are happy with their lives, but after kissing their spouses at midnight, they stop to think about the other.

Is it possible, as Café Society suggests, that a person can love two people at once?  Is there one person to whom we can be devoted our entire lives, whether we marry that one or someone else?  For those of you who are idealists like me, you might rebel at the thought that whoever you are with right now might have another person close to their hearts.  It is not a position I have been in too often, but there have been times when I have been trying to decide to focus on pursuing one person out of a few in whom I was interested.  I did not like that feeling, and I recall talking about it in Confession once.  The priest, an older man who did not seem to have time for my complaining, asked me how old I was and then bluntly told me to make a choice.  Doing so is fine in God’s eyes, particularly if you are seeking Him in your decision.  Allen, too, seems to be okay with picking a direction.  The difference between the two is permanence.  With this movie, as with Allen’s others, commitment is more of a situational option.  You may be with the person you are with now, but that could always change.  Again, I find this philosophy difficult, but it is not exactly out of phase with Christian thought.  To the chagrin of many a seminary, there have been plenty of men who have felt the calling to the priesthood, only to get part way through their formation and find the woman they end up marrying.  I have known a few guys who have done it this way.  It is rarer, but the reverse can also be true.  There have been some who have been in a happy marriage, only to find one day that God is prompting them in another direction.  There is some precedent for these actions in the Bible as well, as when Jesus met many of the disciples.  These men immediately left behind their old lives when Jesus asked, and it changed them forever.  The difference here is that I do not feel Allen’s views on relationships are as serious as a vocation, but I would be surprised if he disagreed.  These experiences change us, if we allow them to do so.  God is constantly wanting to form us, and more often than not, these are lifelong journeys with one path.  We can look back on where we came from as would Bobby, but we need not fall into the same trap.

And therein is the rub in Café Society for this Catholic.  I love it, but as it says in the Litany of Trust prayer, we should not have an excessive preoccupation with the past.  Therefore, if you see this movie, which I think you should, then let it be a cautionary tale.  Nothing bad happens to Bobby, and he is one of Allen’s best characters.  It is a pretty movie to watch, too.  Full recommendation.