Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
Film overview
Family, love and the lives that intersect between them
Hannah and Her Sisters follows three sisters — Hannah, Holly and Lee — and the complicated network of relationships, marriages, ambitions and disappointments surrounding them.
Beginning and ending around family Thanksgiving gatherings, the film moves between several interconnected stories. Hannah appears to have the most settled life, but her husband Elliot has fallen in love with her sister Lee. Holly struggles to find direction in both her career and relationships, while Hannah's former husband Mickey becomes consumed by questions about illness, mortality and the possibility of finding meaning in life.
The ensemble brings together Mia Farrow, Barbara Hershey, Dianne Wiest, Michael Caine and Woody Allen, with Max von Sydow, Carrie Fisher, Lloyd Nolan and Maureen O'Sullivan among the supporting cast. Their stories overlap gradually, allowing characters who initially seem peripheral to become central to one another's lives.
Warm, funny and frequently melancholy, the film combines romantic comedy, family drama and existential anxiety with an unusually rich ensemble structure. It became one of the most acclaimed films of Allen's career and remains one of his most complete portraits of relationships, family and the unexpected directions a life can take.
Watch Hannah and Her Sisters
My review
Lives changing quietly around one another
Hannah and Her Sisters is one of those films that seems to contain an entire world. Every time I return to it I am struck by how much is happening — marriages, affairs, disappointments, illness, ambition, jealousy, family history, fear of death — and yet the film never feels overloaded. Everything seems to flow naturally from one life into another.
What I love most is the way the film moves between its characters. Hannah may be the person around whom the family gathers, but this never becomes simply her story. Elliot, Lee, Holly and Mickey all gradually take possession of the film for a while, and each brings with them a completely different emotional temperature.
The Thanksgiving gatherings are the perfect structure for this. We return to the same family setting while everything underneath it has changed. People arrive carrying secrets, disappointments and decisions that the others may know nothing about. The family appears stable from the outside, yet almost everybody is moving somewhere emotionally.
Mia Farrow gives Hannah a calmness that initially makes her seem like the most secure person in the film. She is dependable, generous and apparently capable of coping with almost anything. But there is something interesting about the way that strength affects the people around her. They rely on Hannah so completely that her competence can almost become intimidating.
Michael Caine's Elliot is much harder to feel comfortable with, and that is part of what makes the performance so good. His infatuation with Lee is romantic in his own mind, but the film never entirely disguises the selfishness of what he is doing. His internal monologues give us access to the excitement and panic of the affair, yet we are also constantly aware of the damage he could cause.
Barbara Hershey gives Lee a vulnerability that prevents the relationship from becoming merely an exercise in betrayal. She is already living in the shadow of Frederick, whose certainty about art, culture and almost everything else leaves very little room for her own identity. Elliot appears to offer another life, although whether that life is really about Lee or about Elliot's fantasy of her is a different question.
Max von Sydow is wonderful as Frederick. He can be pompous, dismissive and infuriating, but he is also completely believable. His contempt for television, popular culture and the people around him is funny precisely because he delivers it with such absolute conviction.
Then there is Holly. Dianne Wiest gives perhaps my favourite performance in the film. Holly is funny, insecure, competitive, impulsive and frequently disappointed in herself. She wants desperately to discover the thing she is supposed to be good at, and you can feel the frustration every time another possibility seems to collapse.
The scenes between Holly and April are particularly good because the friendship contains affection and rivalry at exactly the same time. Carrie Fisher is terrific as April, and the competition between them over work and men never feels artificially manufactured. It feels like the kind of tension that develops when two people care about one another but are also measuring their progress against each other.
Holly's eventual relationship with Mickey is one of the film's most satisfying surprises. Their disastrous first date gives no indication that they might eventually become important to one another, yet when the film brings them together again it makes complete emotional sense. Both characters have spent much of the story searching for something that will make their lives feel more secure.
Mickey's section could almost belong to another film entirely. His fear that he is seriously ill sends him into one of Woody Allen's funniest and most affecting examinations of mortality. Once the immediate medical fear disappears, Mickey is left with the much bigger problem: if death is inevitable, what exactly is he supposed to do with the time before it?
His attempts to find religious certainty are funny, but the comedy works because the fear underneath them is genuine. Mickey isn't looking for an intellectual argument. He wants somebody to tell him there is a reason not to be frightened.
The moment that always gets me is Mickey wandering into a cinema and watching the Marx Brothers. There is something beautifully simple about the realisation that follows. He hasn't solved death. He hasn't discovered the meaning of the universe. He has simply remembered that life contains things capable of giving him pleasure, and perhaps that is reason enough to continue participating in it.
That idea seems to run through the whole film. Nobody finds a perfect answer. Elliot returns to Hannah after nearly destroying their marriage. Lee moves into another stage of her life. Holly eventually finds confidence in her writing and in Mickey. Hannah discovers that the people around her need something from her that she cannot always understand.
Carlo Di Palma's photography gives New York a warmth that feels very different from the black-and-white grandeur of Manhattan. Apartments glow with autumnal light, streets feel busy and lived in, and the city feels like an essential part of the characters' everyday lives.
Music is everywhere too, but in a wonderfully effortless way. Classical pieces, jazz and popular songs drift through apartments, restaurants and concerts as part of the characters' everyday lives. The film never seems to stop and announce its soundtrack; the music simply belongs to the world.
And then we return to Thanksgiving. That final gathering has always felt enormously satisfying to me because the film has travelled such a long way without needing a grand dramatic conclusion. People have changed partners, changed direction and changed their understanding of themselves, while the family continues to gather around the same table.
The final exchange between Mickey and Holly is especially interesting because it was not the ending Allen originally planned. His first version ended on a much darker note, with Elliot unhappily remaining with Hannah and no corresponding happy resolution for Mickey. Allen later said he changed course in the editing because he felt he had not earned the unhappy ending dramatically. The revised ending worked, but he has said he always regretted making that change.
That is why Hannah and Her Sisters remains so special to me. It is funny without treating its characters lightly, philosophical without becoming heavy, romantic without pretending relationships are simple, and hopeful without ignoring how messy people's lives can be.
Almost everybody in the film spends some time believing they need a completely different life. By the end, happiness has arrived in ways none of them could have planned.
Cast and characters
The family at the centre of everything
Three sisters sit at the heart of an ensemble in which marriages, friendships, affairs and family loyalties constantly overlap. Characters move in and out of one another's stories until seemingly separate lives become closely connected.
Hannah
Mia Farrow
Successful, dependable and apparently the most settled of the three sisters, Hannah is the person around whom the family gathers. Her strength is admired by almost everyone, although those closest to her do not always find it easy to live alongside.
Holly
Dianne Wiest
Restless and unsure of the direction her life should take, Holly moves between acting, catering and writing while struggling with insecurity, rivalry and the feeling that everybody else has worked life out before she has.
Lee
Barbara Hershey
The youngest sister is living with the older artist Frederick when Elliot's attraction to her begins to change both their lives. Lee's uncertainty about what she wants becomes one of the film's central emotional conflicts.
Elliot
Michael Caine
Hannah's husband, whose increasingly consuming attraction to Lee becomes one of the film's central secrets. His private thoughts reveal the excitement, guilt and self-deception behind the affair.
Mickey Sachs
Woody Allen
Hannah's former husband, a television writer whose fear that he is seriously ill develops into a much larger crisis about mortality, religion and whether life can have any lasting meaning.
Frederick
Max von Sydow
The intellectual artist with whom Lee lives. Cultured, uncompromising and contemptuous of much of the modern world, Frederick dominates their relationship with absolute certainty about almost everything.
April
Carrie Fisher
Holly's friend and business partner, whose confidence creates an uneasy mixture of friendship and competition between them, particularly when both women become interested in the same man.
Norma
Maureen O'Sullivan
Hannah, Holly and Lee's mother, a former actress whose theatrical personality and turbulent marriage provide another generation's variation on the film's complicated relationships.
Evan
Lloyd Nolan
The sisters' father, whose long marriage to Norma combines affection, argument and years of shared history. Their exchanges provide some of the film's funniest glimpses of family life.
David
Sam Waterston
An architect who attracts both Holly and April, intensifying the competition between the two friends during a memorable evening together in New York.
Dusty
Daniel Stern
A rock musician interested in buying Frederick's work, prompting one of the artist's wonderfully disdainful encounters with the popular culture he dislikes so intensely.
Music and soundtrack
Jazz, opera and the Great American Songbook
Music runs through Hannah and Her Sisters almost as naturally as conversation. Jazz standards, classical music, opera and songs performed by the characters themselves become part of the everyday rhythm of their lives.
Featured recording
I've Heard
That Song Before
Harry James's recording sits perfectly within a film so interested in memory, repetition and relationships that seem to circle back on themselves. The warmth of the big-band sound also contributes to the film's affectionate portrait of family life.
- Music
- Jule Styne
- Lyrics
- Sammy Cahn
- Performed by
- Harry James
Classical and opera
Bach and Puccini
Classical music is woven into the intellectual and cultural world of the characters, from Frederick and Lee's apartment to David's evening with Holly and April.
Johann Sebastian Bach
Concerto for Two Violins
Performed by the Sofia Soloists Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Vassil Kazandjiev, with Georgi Badev and Stoika Milanova as the solo violinists.
Johann Sebastian Bach
Concerto for Harpsichord in F Minor
Another classical selection within the film's unusually broad musical palette, performed by Gustav Leonhardt and the Leonhardt Consort.
Giacomo Puccini
Manon Lescaut
A segment from Puccini's opera was filmed at the Teatro Regio in Turin, providing the centrepiece of David's opera evening with Holly and April.
Giacomo Puccini
Madama Butterfly
Puccini appears again through a recording by the Rome Opera Chorus and Orchestra conducted by Sir John Barbirolli.
Performed in the film
Songs inside the family
Several of the most memorable musical moments come directly from the characters, making the songs feel like part of the family rather than simply background music.
Lloyd Nolan & Maureen O'Sullivan
Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered
Rodgers and Hart's standard is sung by Hannah's parents, Evan and Norma, giving their turbulent marriage one of its warmest and most affectionate moments.
Dianne Wiest
I'm Old Fashioned
Holly performs the Jerome Kern and Johnny Mercer song during an audition, accompanied on piano by Bernie Leighton.
Carrie Fisher
The Way You Look Tonight
April's rendition of the Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields standard becomes another small part of the rivalry developing between her and Holly.
Also heard in the film
Jazz and popular standards
Dave Brubeck
I Remember You
Music by Victor Schertzinger with lyrics by Johnny Mercer.
Bobby Short
I'm in Love Again
Cole Porter's song appears within the film's mixture of jazz, cabaret and popular standards.
Harry James
You Made Me Love You
The Harry James recording adds another period standard to the soundtrack's warm, nostalgic character.
Count Basie
Back to the Apple
Performed by Count Basie and His Orchestra, bringing another unmistakably New York jazz voice into the film.
The effect
The music never feels added to the film. It feels as though these characters have always lived with it.
New York locations
A city lived in rather than observed
Hannah and Her Sisters was filmed entirely on location in New York City. Apartments, parks, hospitals, bookshops, music venues and some of Manhattan's most distinctive buildings become part of the characters' everyday lives.
The setting
Manhattan
New York feels unusually intimate here. Rather than presenting the city as a series of landmarks, the film moves through the places its characters actually inhabit — homes, streets, restaurants, theatres, parks and workplaces.
Hannah's apartment
The family home at the centre of the Thanksgiving gatherings was Mia Farrow's own apartment. Its rooms give the family scenes an unusual sense of familiarity and authenticity.
Family home80 Grand Street
A loft at 80 Grand Street was used for the home shared by Lee and Frederick, placing their enclosed intellectual world within the cast-iron streets of downtown Manhattan.
Lee & FrederickSheep Meadow
Sheep Meadow is among the Central Park locations used throughout the film, helping give its New York a relaxed, everyday quality away from apartments and crowded streets.
Central ParkReservoir jogging track
The running track around the Central Park reservoir is another of the film's recognisable outdoor locations, continuing its movement through the everyday rhythms of Manhattan life.
Central ParkColumbia University
Columbia University, around Amsterdam Avenue and 116th Street, appears among the many real institutions incorporated into the film's portrait of New York.
Amsterdam AvenueJefferson Market Library
The distinctive former courthouse at 425 Avenue of the Americas is one of several architectural New York locations recorded during production.
Sixth AvenueMetropolitan Opera House
Opera becomes part of the complicated evening shared by David, Holly and April. Lincoln Center was among the real New York locations used for the film.
Upper West SideCBGB
The legendary downtown music club appears during Holly and April's ventures into a very different corner of New York's cultural life.
Closed · 2006Pageant Book and Print Shop
The Pageant at 109 East Ninth Street was one of the bookshops included in the film's unusually detailed map of literary and cultural New York.
East 9th StreetMount Sinai Hospital
Mickey's medical scare takes the film into hospitals and doctors' offices, turning ordinary Manhattan locations into the starting point for his much larger fear of mortality.
Fifth AvenueArchitecture
David's New York
The film takes particular pleasure in New York architecture. Production records include an extraordinary collection of buildings scattered across Manhattan.
Ansonia Building
2109 Broadway
Pomander Walk
West 95th Street
Chrysler Building
405 Lexington Avenue
Graybar Building
420 Lexington Avenue
Alwyn Court
Seventh Avenue & 58th Street
New York Yacht Club
37 West 44th Street
New York on film
The city is everywhere, but rarely presented as a tourist attraction. These are places the characters work in, walk through, argue in and call home.
Awards and recognition
One of the most acclaimed films of Allen's career
Hannah and Her Sisters became a major critical and awards success, with recognition for its screenplay, direction, performances, editing and production design.
Major awards
Three Oscar wins
At the 59th Academy Awards, the film received seven nominations and won three — including both supporting acting awards and Woody Allen's original screenplay.
Academy Awards · 1987
The winners
Winner
Supporting Actor
Michael Caine
Elliot
Winner
Supporting Actress
Dianne Wiest
Holly
Winner
Original Screenplay
Woody Allen
Screenplay written directly for the screen
Academy Awards · 1987
Four additional nominations
Best Picture
Robert Greenhut · ProducerDirecting
Woody AllenArt Direction
Stuart Wurtzel · Carol JoffeFilm Editing
Susan E. MorseBAFTA Film Awards · 1987
Two wins from eight nominations
The film also received extensive recognition from BAFTA, including wins for Woody Allen's direction and original screenplay.
Winner
Direction
Woody Allen
Winner
Original Screenplay
Woody Allen
Nominee
Film
Robert Greenhut · Woody Allen
Nominee
Leading Actor
Woody Allen
Nominee
Leading Actor
Michael Caine
Nominee
Leading Actress
Mia Farrow
Nominee
Supporting Actress
Barbara Hershey
Nominee
Editing
Susan E. Morse
Golden Globe Awards · 1987
Best Motion Picture
The film won Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy and received four further Golden Globe nominations.
Winner
Best Motion Picture
Musical or Comedy
Nominee
Best Director
Woody Allen
Nominee
Best Screenplay
Woody Allen
Nominee
Supporting Actor
Michael Caine
Nominee
Supporting Actress
Dianne Wiest
Recognition
The awards reflected the film's greatest strength: an ensemble in which the writing and performances work together almost effortlessly.