5/5 A Gem
  by Donald E. Fulton (Stoneham, MA USA)
One of my favorite movies of all time. Sweet, sentimental, atmospheric, great story telling, well cast, visually and musically gorgeous. It appears no expense and artistic effort was spared. Dozens of scenes, even brief ones often have large costumed casts in beautifully detailed sets. This movie needs to be seen on a large screen to be fully appreciated.

Little gems abound too. When Woody tags along on a date with his aunt, a trio playing for the dancing is shown for all of three seconds, but in those three seconds we get the striking image of a bored female drummer with a cigarette dangling from her lips followed by dramatic, well lit nose exhale just before the cut.

4/5 Finger Exercise
  by David Schweizer (Kansas, USA)
This belongs to that group of Woody's films that seeks to recapture the golden years in Brooklyn, an area in the theatre covered by Neil Simon. Here Woody's unashamed of his sentimental love for bygone years in Brooklyn back at the family homestead, Jewish to the core, long before he became a sophisticated city boy living the life of Noel Coward or Truman Capote, the New York artist. The film is very well made, beautifully photographed. The Woody Allen stock company is here in form, an ensemble to be compared to Scorsese's well-cast character actors. Again, as in other nostalgic pieces, Woody seems to be exercising more than creating, preparing for bigger and better things. These are loving memories, handled well but not with great wit or perception, nothing quite like the superior later pieces that show the narrator more haunted by the past than in love with it. Mia Farrow seems poorly cast here, which is rare because she is wonderful in most everything she does. In this, however, Woody doesn't quite seem to see that she is not a bimbo type and can't pull it off. I don't believe for one second that Mia Farrow was ever a hat-check girl or a night club tart for the mob. She is a good actress but her talents don't include playing a dumb floozy. Diane Keaton, who means nothing to me as an actress, makes a brief appearance but shows more depth and concentration in her brief bit than all of Farrow's frequent appearances put together. Keaton looks like she belongs but is uncomfortable, while Farrow looks like she doesn't belong but is trying to be comfortable. Neither actress is especially sexy, although both are attractive. Woody directs the kids well; they are just bored and unhappy enough to be convincing; here, I think, we see, although it is never mentioned, how miserable the young Woody Allen must have felt being surrounded by such boring people and why he must have yearned to get out and move on in his life. Unlike Spielberg, for example, who always shows kids being happy to be young, Woody's boys are miserable and obviously can't stand the adults. This is altogether an unimpressive little piece, a mere exercise by the master as he focused his attention and moved on from nostalgia to bigger and better things.


5/5 Very Nice Piece Of Nostalgia
  by Craig Connell (Lockport, NY USA)
If you are looking for the normal amount of big laughs from a Woody Allen film, then you will be disappointed here. It's not that kind of film.

I was anything but disappointed, but I knew what the film was all about before I saw it. Actually, what drew me to it was that I had read where this was a wonderful visual film, filled with rich colors and great set designs. It did not let me down. This is a great visual tribute to the 1940s, to be exact from 1938 to 1944. A real treat for the eyes.

The story centers around a Jewish family in Queens and the importance that radio shows had in that day-and-age. Also profiled in here are some of those radio performers.

It does have laughs but not as many as the normal Allen movie because the idea of this is simply to be a nostalgic piece, mainly Allen's tribute to his own family days of growing up, what it was like around his house.

It was interesting to see Seth Green playing Woody as a youngster with flaming red hair. The most interesting person, however, was Diane Wiest who played a man-chasing sister-in-law. The film gives you a real flavor of the period, of New York and of a Jewish family.

Overall, it's simply a nice film....and gorgeous to look at. Sometimes I think some of Allen's work is overrated but, boy, here is one that is definitely underrated.


5/5 Sentimental Nostalgia Even A Woody Hater Can Love
  by Susan Y. Schoonover (Boulder, CO)
Though I am personally fond of most Woody Allen films I can understand why some people don't care for his brand of filmmaking. RADIO DAYS, though, is such a heartfelt Valentine to the pop culture and family life of the World War II era many if not most people will find something to enjoy in the film. Allen does not appear on camera though his narration is full of warmth and wry humor. Child actor, Seth Green, makes a wonderful on screen stand in for him playing the narrator, Joe. Through Joe's eyes we meet his quirky but loveable family who all live together in the mostly Jewish (in the 1940's) Queens neighborhood of Far Rockaway.

The story is told through anecdotes all of which reinforce the importance of radio in the culture and very fabric of 1940's life. Joe's mom played perfectly by Julie Kavner may love listening to the romantic stories on the radio but despite their squabbles her heart still belongs to her diminutive taxi driving husband (Michael Tucker). Single Aunt Bea (Diane Weist) loves dancing to oft played radio songs while going through a series of disastrous dates in a futile search for a husband. Joe, himself is first enthralled by the radio hero "The Masked Avenger" (character actor Wallace Shawn) and later by Biff Baxter (Jeff Daniels) whose exploits inspire him and his buddies to scan the coast looking for Nazi submarines. There is a separate story arc also narrated by an adult Joe (Allen) starring Mia Farrow as Sally a pretty hatcheck/cigarette girl trying to break in to the radio business. Farrow delivers some of the film's funniest lines in a Brooklyn accent which through diction lessons she finally transforms into a successful radio voice. One of the film's most hilarious sequences involves Sally and Rocko (Danny Aiello) a hit man whose duty it is to "knock her off".

The soundtrack of RADIO DAYS is absolute perfection. And the film's biggest strength is the way Allen shows how radio had the power to unite diverse Americans via its airwaves. This point is most vividly made when all of America seems to gather round to listen for progress in the search for a little girl who tragically fell in to a well. This episode caused me to run to Wikipedia to discover this was based on a real 1940's occurrence that Allen remembered from his younger years. RADIO DAYS is a wonderful film that will stand as a realistic depiction of 1940's urban life.


3/5 2.5 stars out of 4
  by One-Line Film Reviews (Easton, MD)
The Bottom Line:

Kind of like a less funny American version of Hope and Glory, Radio Days is one of Allen's least inspired efforts; meandering and unfocused, it coasts on nostalgia for the 40s rather than Allen's considerable skill as a writer/director.