Since this week we’ve been talking about character and about the ways in which characters can be evoked on film, I’d like to make a point about the role that setting plays in the construction of characters, since I think that, out of all films I’ve had a close look at, Annie Hall is the best example of how physical geography can literally map the psyche of a text’s protagonists. Allen’s script employs setting as one of the key elements contributing to our understanding of the characters and their motivations. Specifically, setting functions in three principal ways in Annie Hall. Firstly, it works as a device of characterization, shedding light onto the protagonists’ anxieties, drives and rationales. Secondly, and in close relation to this previous function, it exposes the points of conflict stuttering the relationship and the obstacles inherent in the lovers’ personalities that will ultimately render their romance unfeasible. And thirdly, setting works to develop and reinforce the overriding themes prevalent in the entire film, commenting on such notions as authenticity – of both lifestyle and culture –, mortality and the stifling antagonism between hedonism and anhedonia.

As is the trademark of Woody Allen as an auteur, in this film too New York City is the setting that undoubtedly steals the scene. Graham McCann argues that in Woody Allen’s films, New York functions as “an extension of his own psyche”( Graham McCann, Woody Allen: New Yorker. London: Polity Press, 1990, p. 11), and Annie seems to support this parallel when she accuses him in Los Angeles that he is “incapable of enjoying life… I mean you’re like New York City. You’re just this person. You’re like an island unto yourself.” Alvy’s high culture pretensions and his limited range of interests mirror the characteristics of the city he adores, but provide an inadequate match for Annie’s breadth, curiosity and liveliness. His inability of “enjoying life”, forthrightly identified by Annie, is moreover seen by his best friend Rob precisely as a product of living in the Big Apple.

Alvy could never respect the Californian lifestyle because living in L.A. is too easy and thus goes against his philosophy of upholding one’s moral duty for anhedonia and difficulty, a quintessential attraction of New York. Here, the weather is always fair, the girls are easy to go to bed with, there is no garbage, and even from a gastronomical perspective, L.A.’s mashed yeast contrasts heavily with the struggling live lobsters of the Big Apple. This inauthentic lifestyle also comes into conflict with another theme that Alvy considers fundamental to his intellectual make-up: the issue of mortality. Alvy could never feel content in a culture so subjugated by the denial of death – in Los Angeles, people eat health foods and protect themselves from alpha rays to avoid getting old, which our protagonist deems not only artificial and inauthentic, but also morally and intellectually condemnable.

The third significant geographical setting that completes the spatial discourse of Annie Hall is Wisconsin, home to Annie’s WASP-ish, “healthy” and “very American” family. As a split screen comparison between Annie’s quintessentially Midwestern family and Alvy’s intrinsically Jewish counterpart reveals the diverging behaviors and modes of interaction characterizing the two clans, one cannot help but wonder whether the fact that the two protagonists were molded by such strikingly different environments is a surmountable obstruction, or whether this scene is a foreshadowing of the eventual mismatch inherent in their upbringing and formation.

Thus, the dichotomous and symbolically rich settings that weave the spatial framework of Annie Hall are essential to the film’s success in depicting convincing portraits of the two complex personalities that inhabit its world – therefore, setting explicates their psychological make-ups while simultaneously commenting on the ultimate destiny of their relationship. In fact, the three main settings in the film are themselves typified to such an extent that it would take little imagination to view them as distinct characters. Uri Margolin defines character essentially as “storyworld participant” (66) and, seen from this light, it can easily be argued that the three main settings of the film, with New York as an obvious case-in-point, by way of transforming the protagonists and impacting the outcome of their relationship, can be said to participate in the storyworld as inanimate characters. For Prof. Grindon’s American Film Genres course, we read an article by David Grote in which the author classified the characters in romantic comedies according to three types: the Innocent, the Fool and the Scoundrel, and argued that most romantic comedy protagonists fall into one of these three categories (David Grote. “The Comedic Tradition.” The End of Comedy. Hamden, Conn.: Archon, 1983, p. 39-48). Based on this perspective, it is indeed really interesting to think of the settings not only as distinct characters, but perhaps even as the three character types that Grote argues are emblematic of the romantic comedy. As follows, the Midwest, the heart of the orderly, well-off WASP countryside far from the tumult of the city, can be seen as the Innocent; Los Angeles, with its garish pop culture buffoons, mantras and anti-sun helmets can be considered to be the Fool; while Alvy’s dear New York, street-smart and pretentious, savvy and exclusive, is a natural at playing the role of the Scoundrel