''Take the Money and Run'' is a 1969 American
mockumentary
A mockumentary (a blend of ''mock'' and ''documentary''), fake documentary or docu-comedy is a type of film or television show depicting fictional events but presented as a documentary.
These productions are often used to analyze or comment on c ...
comedy film
A comedy film is a category of film which emphasizes humor. These films are designed to make the audience laugh through amusement. Films in this style traditionally have a happy ending (black comedy being an exception). Comedy is one of the ol ...
directed by
Woody Allen
Heywood "Woody" Allen (born Allan Stewart Konigsberg; November 30, 1935) is an American film director, writer, actor, and comedian whose career spans more than six decades and multiple Academy Award-winning films. He began his career writing ...
. Allen co-wrote the screenplay with
Mickey Rose
Michael "Mickey" Rose (May 20, 1935 – April 7, 2013) was an American comedy writer and screenwriter.
Life and career
Rose was born in Bedford–Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, and spent his childhood there and in Crown Heights in the same borough of New ...
and stars alongside
Janet Margolin
Janet Natalie Margolin (July 25, 1943 – December 17, 1993) was an American theater, television and film actress.
Early life
Margolin was born in New York City, the daughter of Benjamin and Annette (née Lief) Margolin. Her father was a Russi ...
. The film chronicles the life of Virgil Starkwell, an inept bank robber.
Filmed in San Francisco and
San Quentin State Prison
San Quentin State Prison (SQ) is a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation state prison for men, located north of San Francisco in the unincorporated place of San Quentin in Marin County.
Opened in July 1852, San Quentin is the ...
,
''Take the Money and Run'' received
Golden Laurel
The Laurel Awards was an American cinema awards system established to honor films, actors, actresses, producers, directors, and composers. This award was created by the ''Motion Picture Exhibitor'' magazine, and ran from 1948 to 1971 (with the ...
nominations for Male Comedy Performance (Woody Allen) and Male New Face (Woody Allen), and a
Writers Guild of America Award nomination for Best Comedy Written Directly for the Screen (Woody Allen, Mickey Rose).
Plot
Virgil Starkwell's (
Woody Allen
Heywood "Woody" Allen (born Allan Stewart Konigsberg; November 30, 1935) is an American film director, writer, actor, and comedian whose career spans more than six decades and multiple Academy Award-winning films. He began his career writing ...
) story is told in documentary style, using fake stock footage and 'interviews' with people who knew him. He begins a life of crime at a young age. As a child, Virgil is a frequent target of bullies, who take his glasses and stamp on them on the floor. As an adult, Virgil is clumsy and socially awkward, and both police and judges discipline him by stamping on Virgil's glasses.
Virgil falls in love with a young lady, Louise (
Janet Margolin
Janet Natalie Margolin (July 25, 1943 – December 17, 1993) was an American theater, television and film actress.
Early life
Margolin was born in New York City, the daughter of Benjamin and Annette (née Lief) Margolin. Her father was a Russi ...
), a laundry worker. They marry and later have a baby.
Virgil attempts to rob a bank, but is arrested when he is embroiled in an argument about the handwriting on a demand note he hands to a cashier. He is sent to prison, but attempts an escape using a bar of soap carved to resemble a gun. Unfortunately for him, it is raining outside and his gun dissolves. He ''does'' escape, but by accident. Joining a mass breakout plan, Virgil is the only inmate not warned that the scheme had been called off.
Outside but unemployed, Virgil finds no way to support himself and his family. Eventually, he is rearrested and sent to a
chain gang, where he is undernourished (the single meal of the day is a bowl of steam) and brutally tortured (consigned to a steam box with an insurance salesman).
Virgil again escapes but is eventually captured when attempting to rob a former friend who reveals he is now a cop. He is sentenced to 800 years, but remains optimistic knowing that "with good behavior, I can get that cut in half". In the last scene, he is shown carving a bar of soap and asking the interviewer if it is raining outside.
Cast
Production
This was the second film directed by Woody Allen, and the first with original footage (after ''
What's Up, Tiger Lily?
''What's Up, Tiger Lily?'' is a 1966 American comedy film directed by Woody Allen in his feature-length directorial debut.
Allen took a Japanese spy film, '' International Secret Police: Key of Keys'' (1965), and overdubbed it with completely or ...
'', which consisted of visuals taken from a Japanese
James Bond
The ''James Bond'' series focuses on a fictional British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short-story collections. Since Fleming's death in 1964, eight other authors have ...
knockoff). He had originally wanted
Jerry Lewis
Jerry Lewis (born Joseph Levitch; March 16, 1926 – August 20, 2017) was an American comedian, actor, singer, filmmaker and humanitarian. As his contributions to comedy and charity made him a global figure in popular culture, pop culture ...
to direct, but when that did not work out, Allen decided to direct it himself. Allen's decision to become his own director was partially spurred on by the chaotic and uncontrolled filming of ''
Casino Royale'' (1967), in which he had appeared two years previously. This film marked the first time Allen would perform the triple duties of writing, directing, and acting in a film. The manic, almost slapstick style is similar to that of Allen's next several films, including ''
Bananas
A banana is an elongated, edible fruit – botanically a berry – produced by several kinds of large herbaceous flowering plants in the genus ''Musa''. In some countries, bananas used for cooking may be called "plantains", distinguis ...
'' (1971) and ''
Sleeper'' (1973).
Allen discussed the concept of filming a documentary in an interview with Richard Schickel:
The film was shot
on location in
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
,
including one scene set in Ernie's restaurant, whose striking red interior was immortalized in
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock (13 August 1899 – 29 April 1980) was an English filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 featur ...
's ''
Vertigo
Vertigo is a condition where a person has the sensation of movement or of surrounding objects moving when they are not. Often it feels like a spinning or swaying movement. This may be associated with nausea, vomiting, sweating, or difficulties w ...
'' (1958). Other scenes were filmed at
San Quentin State Prison
San Quentin State Prison (SQ) is a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation state prison for men, located north of San Francisco in the unincorporated place of San Quentin in Marin County.
Opened in July 1852, San Quentin is the ...
,
where 100 prisoners were paid a small fee to work on the film. The regular cast and crew were stamped each day with a special ink that glowed under ultra-violet light so the guards could tell who was allowed to leave the prison grounds at the end of the day. (One of the actors in the San Quentin scenes was Micil Murphy, who knew the prison well: he had served five and a half years there, for armed robbery, before being paroled in 1966.)
Allen initially filmed a downbeat ending in which he was shot to death, courtesy of special effects from A.D. Flowers. Reputedly the lighter ending is due to the influence of Allen's editor,
Ralph Rosenblum
Ralph Rosenblum (October 13, 1925 – September 6, 1995) was an American film editor who worked extensively with the directors Sidney Lumet and Woody Allen. He won the 1977 BAFTA Award for Best Editing for his work on ''Annie Hall'', and publish ...
, in his first collaboration with Allen.
Reception
Box office
The film opened on August 18, 1969 at the 68th St. Playhouse in New York City
[ and grossed a house record $33,478 in its first week and even more in its second week with $35,999.
By 1973, the film had earned rentals of $2,590,000 in the United States and Canada and $450,000 in other countries. After all costs were deducted, it reported a loss of $610,000.]
Critical response
The film received mostly positive reviews. Vincent Canby
Vincent Canby (July 27, 1924 – October 15, 2000) was an American film and theatre critic who served as the chief film critic for ''The New York Times'' from 1969 until the early 1990s, then its chief theatre critic from 1994 until his death in ...
of ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' described it as "a movie that is, in effect, a feature-length, two-reel comedy—something very special and eccentric and funny", even though toward the end "a certain monotony sets in" with Allen's comedy rhythm. In his later review of ''Annie Hall
''Annie Hall'' is a 1977 American satirical romantic comedy-drama film directed by Woody Allen from a screenplay written by him and Marshall Brickman, and produced by Allen's manager, Charles H. Joffe. The film stars Allen as Alvy Singer, w ...
'', Canby revised his opinion of ''Take the Money and Run'', stating "''Annie Hall'' is not terribly far removed from ''Take the Money and Run'', his first work as a triple-threat man, which is not to put down the new movie but to upgrade the earlier one".
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...
of the ''Chicago Sun-Times
The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...
'' found the film to have many funny moments, but "in the last analysis it isn't a very funny movie", with the fault lying with its visual humor and editing. In October 2013, the film was voted by the ''Guardian
Guardian usually refers to:
* Legal guardian, a person with the authority and duty to care for the interests of another
* ''The Guardian'', a British daily newspaper
(The) Guardian(s) may also refer to:
Places
* Guardian, West Virginia, Unite ...
'' readers as the sixth best film directed by Allen.
On the review aggregator web site Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
, the film holds a 91% positive rating with an average rating of 6.9/10, based on 23 reviews.
Awards and honors
* Golden Laurel Nomination for Male Comedy Performance (Woody Allen)
* Golden Laurel Nomination for Male New Face (Woody Allen)
* Writers Guild of America Award Nomination for Best Comedy Written Directly for the Screen (Woody Allen, Mickey Rose).
The film is recognized by American Film Institute
The American Film Institute (AFI) is an American nonprofit film organization that educates filmmakers and honors the heritage of the motion picture arts in the United States. AFI is supported by private funding and public membership fees.
Leade ...
in these lists:
* 2000: AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs – #66
* 2005: AFI's 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes:
** Bank Teller #1: "Does this look like "gub" or "gun"?"
:: Bank Teller #2: "Gun. See? But what's "abt" mean?"
:: Virgil Starkwell: "It's "act". A-C-T. Act natural. Please put fifty thousand dollars into this bag and act natural."
:: Bank Teller #1: "Oh, I see. This is a holdup?"
:: – Nominated
Home media
''Take the Money and Run'' was released to DVD by MGM Home Video on July 6, 2004 as a Region 1 fullscreen DVD. Kino Video released the film on Blu-ray in October 2017, although the only bonus features are trailers for other films.
See also
* List of American films of 1969
This is a list of American films released in 1969.
''Midnight Cowboy'' won the Academy Award for Best Picture.
__TOC__
A–B
C–G
H–M
N–S
T–Z
Documentaries and shorts
See also
* 1969 in the United States
External links
...
References
External links
*
*
*
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Take The Money And Run
1960s crime comedy films
1969 films
American crime comedy films
American heist films
American independent films
American prison comedy films
Films scored by Marvin Hamlisch
Films about bank robbery
Films directed by Woody Allen
Films produced by Charles H. Joffe
Films set in San Quentin State Prison
Films shot in San Francisco
Films shot in San Quentin, California
American mockumentary films
Films with screenplays by Woody Allen
ABC Motion Pictures films
Films set in San Francisco
Cinerama Releasing Corporation films
1969 comedy films
1960s English-language films
1960s American films