I usually like Woody Allen, but "Manhattan Murder Mystery" was kind of a drag. The first hour's pretty annoying, mostly because Diane Keaton is. But it picks up in the last 45 minutes once there is a murder. Leave out that and the mystery and it could be just "Manhattan."
Keaton and Allen playing a bickering couple once again makes you feel like you're in a typical Woody Allen movie. But with a mystery thrown in. The movie gets better when Alan Alda and Anjelica Houston are on screen since they're not playing their past Woody Allen characters.
"Manhattan Murder Mystery" telegraphs its inspirations a bit too obviously, too. The climax is straight out of "The Lady from Shanghai," a crucial clue is delivered with a bus billboard advertising "Vertigo," etc. The basic plot (neighbor killed wife?) is from "Rear Window." Etc.
As I said, the first hour's kind of a chore. But things do pick up in the second. The solution is pretty good and the way the scheme to trap the killer backfires is also handled well. So the movie definitely gets better as it goes. You just have to wait it out.
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