Woody Allen’s supposedly undiscovered masterpiece is a complete failure, featuring a one-note performance from the usually hilarious Larry David.
Comment
10/13/09
Whatever Works (2009)
47
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:124
Fresh:58
Rotten:66
Average Rating:5.3/10
Consensus: Based upon a script written in the 1970s, Woody Allen's Whatever Works suffers from a lack of fresh ideas.
Runtime: 1 hr 32 mins
Genre: Comedies
US Box Office: $5,183,644
Synopsis: The New York-based humor of Woody Allen and CURB YOUR ENTHUSIAM’s Larry David seems like a natural match, and the pair unite for the first time in this comedy. WHATEVER WORKS follows a rich man... [More]
Starring: Larry David, Evan Rachel Wood, Patricia Clarkson, Ed Begley
Director: Woody Allen
Reviews for Whatever Works
Top CriticI really enjoyed the film. It's not Allen's best and there is a theatricality that keeps us at arm's length; despite the highly successful direct to camera confidences, which are surprisingly endearing. Allen has knitted together a sweater of angst
10/08/09
Top CriticAllen wrote the script almost 40 years ago, and then voluntarily shelved it because studios at the time expressed doubts about its quality. If it wasn’t good enough back then, why drag it out now?
10/14/09
Top CriticFans of Allen's work should be happy to find him back in Manhattan, still exploring the meaning of his existence through some typically funny one-liners.
10/11/09
Top CriticI actually quite enjoyed this, except this sort of constant rant: the contempt he has for humanity and yadda yadda yadda.
10/14/09
Top CriticIn the end, Whatever Works just about does work, though there’s an awkwardness about it that is never quite dispelled.
10/14/09
Top CriticVicious laughs and smart shots at our "enlightened" humanity abound, but a nasty current of misanthropy overpowers Woody' latest work.
10/11/09
Top CriticThe result is a stew that is not as satisfying as the gumbo which Boris Yellnikoff (Larry David) gets to enjoy
10/08/09
Top CriticWhatever Works is funnier than anything he's done in a long time -- funny in the robust vaudevillian manner of Groucho Marx.
10/15/09
Top CriticComing off last year's Vicky Cristina Barcelona, the freshest Allen film in more than a decade, Whatever Works plays like a hoary old Broadway stage comedy yanked, reluctantly, into the present.
06/25/09
Despite the negative tenor of the dialogue, the film itself has a sweet quality.
06/18/09
Woody's latest shrewdly upends the filmmaker's own comic pessimisms
07/07/09
Consider our enthusiasm curbed.
07/03/09
If you want to see Larry David limp around and see his view of 'the glass is probably covered with diseases so who cares if it's half empty or half full,' then go along for this ride.
06/29/09
A spoonful of Melody St. Ann Celestine helps the misanthrophy go down.
07/03/09
A more mean spirited but still very funny film aimed mainly at Woody'searly period devotees that includes a spirited turn by Evan Rachel Wood.
09/08/09
[Woody] Allen's execution -- dim, repressed Red Staters get liberated in the big city -- will register best with his core audience.
06/18/09
I am a huge Woody Allen fan, but I had a hard time with Whatever Works.
06/27/09
The role of Boris was written for Zero Mostel, who just might have been able to pull it off. But with David instead of vulnerable humanity you get a lot of agitated monologues...
07/03/09
Whatever Works won’t set the world on fire but it has more than its share of riotously hysterical moments and delicious absurdities.
07/03/09
Latest News for Whatever Works
June 18, 2009:
Critics Consensus: Year One Fails To Beget Laughs
This week at the movies, we've got Biblical bloopers (Year One, starring Jack Black and Michael Cera) and an engagement of convenience (The Proposal, starring Sandra Bullock and... More...
May 10, 2009:
Trailer Bulletin: Whatever Works 
Larry David steps in as Woody Allen's latest on-screen surrogate in "Whatever Works," due out June 19. Watch the trailer now! More...
May 10, 2009:
Trailer & Poster review
More...
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