Radio Days When watching a film one has to have a suspension of disbelief, as well as a certain level of imagination to follow the story. Listening to radio programs back in the times when films existed, but televisions didn't, the radio let the imagination wander to a high degree. Orson Welles and his radio program The War of the Worlds proved how far the imagination could wander. Radio was a tool of escapism during the depression era and World War II years in America, and the World War II years in America is the setting for Woody Allen's film Radio Days. Radio Days is an dreamlike examination of the big-band music and programs of early 1940's radio. It's also the story of a family living in Brooklyn, loosely based on Allen's own childhood, whose lives revolve around the family radio. "The scene is Rockaway. The time is my childhood. It's my old neighborhood, and forgive me if I tend to romanticize the past. I mean, it wasn't always as stormy and rainswept as this. But I remember it that way because that was it at its most beautiful." Radio Days was made after the very successful Oscar winning Woody Allen film Hannah and Her Sisters. Woody, who himself does not star in the film, takes a large family such that is found in Hannah and Her Sisters, and examines these character's lives. Radio Days mostly focuses on the apparent childhood version of Woody, Joe, played by Seth Green. The only thing missing are the glasses. Joe is always being smacked in the head by his parents, who are "two people who could find an argument in any subject." One day while at the zoo, Joe and his parents run into a teenage mathematical wizard from the radio program The Whiz Kids. Upon seeing how sophisticated the young man is at 14, his father smacks Joe on the head several times and exclaims, "This simple palooka can't even pass a simple arithmetic exam. Why can't you be a genius? I'll tell you why, because you are too busy listening to the radio all the time." Allen, who narrates the film, was asked how close the story is to his actual upbringing in Brooklyn in the 1930s and 40s. "Some things are very close and some things are not. But a lot of it is based on an exaggerated view of my childhood." (Bjorkman 158) Joe spends most of his time hanging out with friends spying on naked women through windows, listening to The Masked Avenge and The Lone Ranger, and looking for Nazi submarines along the shore because Bif Baxter, the radio star, says that's where they can be found hiding. Allen comments in his narration that songs on the radio always bring back certain memories, such as his first kiss and the time his Aunt and Uncle took him to Radio City Music Hall to see a movie. "You know, those songs did have memories for me. They were real songs with real memories." (Bjorkman 164) This cycle of musical flashbacks is a technique that the film follows throughout. Each character in the film, and their relation to a certain song or a radio program, defines who they are in terms of the way they dress, their social life, and status in the family. Joe's cousin Ruthie dresses and dances like a flamenco dancer while listening to Carmen Miranda on the radio. The design of Radio Days helps add a dreamy mood to the film, giving an overwhelming feeling of nostalgia. All the houses are crammed together, and living conditions are rather confined, while the radio studios are spacious and elegant. Throughout most of Allen's own childhood, family members shared the various apartments the family moved into over the years. "I had a rather dim view on my family's physical appearance, likening the relatives on my mother's side to something in a petri dish. I was very hard on my family and we all constantly teased each other and fought, but were close" (Lax 16). The philosophy of a large family living together comes out in Radio Days. It comments not only on Woody Allen's own childhood, but also a great era in American history. Towards the end of the film, the entire family is gathered around the radio at the news of a little girl trapped in a well, thus commenting on how important the radio was not only as a news and entertainment source, but as a way to bring the family together in this time period. As the family of the girl grieves, so does each American listening to their radio. Radio Days was nominated for two Academy Awards, but unlike Hannah and Her Sisters, didn't win any. Pauline Kael said of the film, "Woody Allen has found in himself the heartfelt coyness of Louis B. Mayer, without the redeeming vulgar joyfulness. Allen goes for the lump in the collective throat, carefully, tastefully." (Meade 180) The film is guilty of being nostalgic, but there is a complete innocence to it. Made in 1987, Radio Days doesn't fit the spectrum of the commercial films of the 1980s. It was made in a decade that television served as the family gathering place, not the radio. There were still soap operas and variety shows, but now there were faces to put to voices now. The imagination needed to listen to a radio show was diminished with the invention of television. "Radio was simply at the heart of popular culture, able to pervade a person's life even more significantly than television does today." (Brode 250) Throughout the entire film, people are listening to radio while doing other things in and around the house. Only one person seems to be looming at the speaker, while others are doing chores. In my opinion, Woody Allen was making a comment that radio animated people. People could talk about the shows with others, and participate as well with various call-in contests. There was a process to listening to radio, and there's not much of process to watching television. Television tends to do the thinking for you, making all the decisions. You don't have to call into the television shows, because they've already won you over. I feel that the film is so nostalgic because you are dealing with a highly creative and entertaining era. "Before the advent of TV, radio stood at the center of the nation's consciousness, informing our attitudes as a people while reflecting an idealized vision of ourselves." (Brode 250) "I never forgot that New Year's Eve when Aunt Bea awakened me to watch 1944 come in. I've never forgotten any of those people or any of the voices we would hear on the radio. Though the truth is, with the passing of each New Year's Eve those voices do seem to grow dimmer and dimmer." --Voice of Joe at the end of Radio Days Bibliography Bjorkman, Stig. Woody Allen on Woody Allen. New York: Grove Press, 1993. Brode, Douglas. The Films of Woody Allen. New York: Citadel Press Book, 1991. Navacelle, Thierry de. Woody Allen On Location. New York: Willaim Morrow and Company, 1987. Lax, Eric. Woody Allen: A Biography. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1991. Meade, Marion. The Unruly Life of Woody Allen. New York: Scribner, 2000. Radio Days. Dir. Woody Allen. Orion, 1987. |
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