Allen v. Farrow 2021
The bitter feud between Woody Allen and Mia Farrow has enrapt public attention and stoked controversy since 1992, when Farrow accused Allen of molesting her seven-year old daughter Dylan. In the decades since, the matter has wrenched its way through the court of public opinion, but with limited information released, those who support Allen or believe Dylan have had few options but to harden their opinions as to whether the director is a predator or a martyr.
In Allen v. Farrow, a four-part series on HBO, directors Amy Zeiring and Kirby Dick (The Hunting Ground, On the Record) take on the challenging task of looking at this topic afresh. They reveal explosive new testimony, home video, court documents, and never before heard audio recordings of Dylan at the time. In intimate interviews with Mia, her family and friends, police investigators, experts and witnesses, and—most importantly—Dylan herself, Zeiring and Dick strip away the decades of bias to let the shocking facts speak for themselves.
The bitter feud between Woody Allen and Mia Farrow has enrapt public attention and stoked controversy since 1992, when Farrow accused Allen of molesting her seven-year old daughter Dylan. In the decades since, the matter has wrenched its way through the court of public opinion, but with limited information released, those who support Allen or believe Dylan have had few options but to harden their opinions as to whether the director is a predator or a martyr.
In Allen v. Farrow, a four-part series on HBO, directors Amy Zeiring and Kirby Dick (The Hunting Ground, On the Record) take on the challenging task of looking at this topic afresh. They reveal explosive new testimony, home video, court documents, and never before heard audio recordings of Dylan at the time. In intimate interviews with Mia, her family and friends, police investigators, experts and witnesses, and—most importantly—Dylan herself, Zeiring and Dick strip away the decades of bias to let the shocking facts speak for themselves.
Here’s a documentary about a writer-director who’s already been cast aside, showing both how he overcame it once and even more rigorously arguing why he, and others like him, can’t be allowed to do it again. In short, it works. After this documentary, no one should want to hear from Allen for a very, very long time."
IndieWire
"But putting Dylan on screen, at age 7 and, through earlier home-movie footage, even younger, underscores just how terribly fragile and vulnerable she was. The world has only known the adult Dylan, the one strong enough to come forward knowing that she would undoubtedly face a torrent of abuse and worse—and knowing even then that she still might not be believed. But it’s not just her we have to deal with. It’s the little girl on the tape, telling us her story, telling us it was wrong."
Slate
“Allen v. Farrow goes beyond the scandalous headlines and makes a compelling argument that Allen got away with the unthinkable thanks to his fame, money and revered standing in the world of film — and that a little girl never received justice. The documentarians pored over years of custody trial evidence, home movies, recorded phone conversations, photo exhibits and more, piecing together a harrowing picture of Allen as an abuser and master manipulator and Dylan as his silenced, disbelieved victim."
LA Times
“Allen v. Farrow is an overdue reckoning with Mia and Dylan’s story and the mores of an entire cultural moment. Like the Michael Jackson documentary Leaving Neverland, which starkly placed his survivors’ perspectives in the foreground, it forces us to confront uncomfortable truths. As it connects the dots, methodically and gruesomely, you’ll never see Allen the same way again.”
Buzzfeed News
IndieWire
"But putting Dylan on screen, at age 7 and, through earlier home-movie footage, even younger, underscores just how terribly fragile and vulnerable she was. The world has only known the adult Dylan, the one strong enough to come forward knowing that she would undoubtedly face a torrent of abuse and worse—and knowing even then that she still might not be believed. But it’s not just her we have to deal with. It’s the little girl on the tape, telling us her story, telling us it was wrong."
Slate
“Allen v. Farrow goes beyond the scandalous headlines and makes a compelling argument that Allen got away with the unthinkable thanks to his fame, money and revered standing in the world of film — and that a little girl never received justice. The documentarians pored over years of custody trial evidence, home movies, recorded phone conversations, photo exhibits and more, piecing together a harrowing picture of Allen as an abuser and master manipulator and Dylan as his silenced, disbelieved victim."
LA Times
“Allen v. Farrow is an overdue reckoning with Mia and Dylan’s story and the mores of an entire cultural moment. Like the Michael Jackson documentary Leaving Neverland, which starkly placed his survivors’ perspectives in the foreground, it forces us to confront uncomfortable truths. As it connects the dots, methodically and gruesomely, you’ll never see Allen the same way again.”
Buzzfeed News
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