Sweet and Lowdown
Synopsis:
A group of modern day jazz experts reminisce about the life of an , little known
jazz musician who lived during the 1930¹s. Emmet Ray (Penn) is a brilliant,
extroverted jazz guitarist with a sizable ego. Bouncing from woman to woman,
he finds little in life to take seriously the music he plays, which consumes
his entire being. But in City he meets Hattie ( Morton) a poor, mute laundry
worker he stays with for a year before moving on. Eventually Emmet marries an
elegant writer (Thurman), who cheats on him with a member of an organized crime
family, leaving Emmet to realize his mistake in leaving Hattie.
Rating: "Sweet and Lowdown" is rated PG-13 (parents strongly cautioned). It includes jokey sexual references and brief sexual situations.
Written and directed by Woody Allen; director of photography, Zhao Fei; edited by Alisa Lepselter; music arranged and conducted by Dick Hyman; production designer, Santo Loquasto; produced by Jean Doumanian; released by Sony Pictures Classics. Running time: 95 minutes. This film is rated PG-13.
Cast: Sean Penn (Emmet Ray), Samantha Morton (Hattie), Uma Thurman (Blanche), Anthony LaPaglia (Al Torrio) and Brian Markinson (Bill Shields), Gretchen Mol (Ellie).
Reviews
Janet Maslin, The New York Times
""Sweet and Lowdown" is an appealingly personal film for Woody Allen, and not in any tired sense of what personal means. It celebrates the kind of vintage 1930s jazz that has tootled through the soundtrack of many a previous Allen film, and that finally has the chance to occupy center stage."Salon Magazine
"Rising star Samantha Morton shines in this charming, finely crafted film from Woody Allen."
Want to Know More?
Jazz Experts Speak on the Sweet and Low Down
Did Woody Allen get his facts right? Moviefone.com interviews a jazzman to get the lowdown.Indiewire Interviews the Brilliant Director
"You hire someone like Sean. He's been great for years before I met him. The thing that you want is not to mess him up. I want him to do that thing that Sean Penn does that he's always been great at."
