Manhattan vs. Annie Hall

I was just having a conversation with a dear old friend of mine,* after learning that Manhattan is one of the Sunshine's upcoming midnight movies, about whether that film is indeed Woody Allen's best. Several of my friends feel that Manhattan beats Annie Hall,† but I'm sympathetic to both sides of that argument. Anyway, here's what I came up with:

1. Annie Hall is a serious comedy; Manhattan is a funny drama.
2. Annie Hall is about a relationship; Manhattan is about relationships (or about dating, you could say, depending on what you meant by dating‡: Manhattan is about...what, six relationships between seven people?—depending on how you count 'em, like whether you count Wallace Shawn's "little homunculus").

I sort of thought I had more to say about this. I probably just forgot some of it: for the past 12 hours or so I've been fighting off what appear to be ocular migraines? The small hypochondriac part of my brain is already saying "Narm! Narm!" and thinking about making a trip to the sperm bank...§

[O.K., so I couldn't figure out which image I wanted to put up from Annie Hall, so I'm just going to include the other three that jumped out at me. Maybe putting up four from one and one from the other reveals my own secret preference? Or maybe all it says is which movie makes me happier, which isn't quite the same as which one I like better. There's a subject for discussion: why is it that human beings prefer stories that are sad to stories that are just flat happy? Who was it who said, "Happiness writes white"? What the hell?]

Cute couple, have fun together.

This one would be my top choice except I'm not 100% convinced it's actually in the movie. Outtake?

Somehow extremely representative.

* Very old: she must be twenty-eight or something.

† Back when I was really into Woody Allen (in the 20th century, back when even his "bad" movies were pretty good), I read a lot of interviews and things, and I think I remember that he expressed frustration with the general view that these movies were his best. And though he didn't say this and neither did the interviewer, I couldn't help but note that these two films are (1) indeed often identified as his best and (2) among the very few that he co-wrote (with Marshall Brickman) instead of writing on his own. I can only imagine how frustrating that would be: write and direct something like a movie every year for 30 years, and everybody's favorites are the ones you got help with?

‡ This may deserve its own post.

§ For immortality!