Woody Allen

I have just seen "Match Point", a Woody Allen film. The first part, up to about a third of the way through, is made in such a simple style that it looked to me as if he had been trained to film soap operas: the camera moves from face to face, from scene to face to scene, as is done in, say, "Coronation Street" - who cares about style when all people are interested in is how the story develops? But then the story develops so dramatically, tensely and disturbingly that I didn't care how or what style was being used because I was completely gripped by the plot.
It is similar to "Crimes and Misdemeanours" in that it is about a murder and how the action affects the protagonist.... aren't all murder plots about this? Well, no; most are about "who done it", and if there is any moral dimension in a "who-dun-it" mostly it's concerned with the detective rather than the murderer.
Woody is concerned, like Dostoievski, with the soul of the murderer, especially if he gets away with it.
Dostoievski has answers and they are to do with our belief in God. Woody Allen, I feel, does not believe so he has no answers. He is saying "this is how life is - no moral basis to it; if you can get away with murder there is no reason to think you can't live a normal life". Which is a pretty gloomy thought.
But what an exciting film! And as A.C.Scott wrote about "Match Point" in the New York Times: "The gloom of random, meaningless existence has rarely been so much fun."