The Allegory of the Cave and The Purple Rose of Cairo

Woody Allen brings together a masterful work of story telling using both sound and visuals in The Purple Rose of Cairo. The story is told as a meta-film or a dissection of what it is to be the artist looking out at the audience and how that audience relates to the artist and the artist's work.

The film begins and ends with the voice of Fred Astaire singing of his cares that hung around him through the week and seemingly vanish like a gambler's streak as he danced cheek to cheek. The first image shown is Cecilia intensely examining a movie poster for The Purple Rose of Cairo, ripped away from her revery ("...heaven, I'm in heaven..." the song continues) by reality clanging behind her. This reality itself is not immutable, as later, we see the movie character Tom Baxter step in and out of it. The song parallels her gambling husband Monk and her troubles with work, vanishing from her thoughts when she escapes into watching and talking about movies.

Tom Baxter is a prisoner of the inner movie within this movie of the same name. He plays out the life of a the prisoner in The Allegory of the Cave. His introduction is in the flickering shadows of an Egyptian crypt or cave. The Allegory of the Cave is referenced again once Baxter has left the inner film for the outer world. People attempting to see the movie are angry and confused, demanding their money back or saying, “I saw the movie last week, this is not what happens.  I want what happened last week happen this week, otherwise what is life all about anyway?” It is during this scene that there are flickering lights over the patrons as they stand outside the theater, mimicking the flickering projection screen effect. I think this is a cue for both the actual audience and Tom Baxter. For the actual audience, it re-enforces what we are seeing isn’t real. For Tom this world is a projection that he was viewing while repeating his performances on the inner movie. Another irony in this is that the the holiday trip of the inner movie is to avoid doing the same thing over and over and yet is exactly what movie goers want to see, over and over.

When Tom transitions to the outer movie, the two begin to take on a role reversal. In the inner movie, the characters begin to sit around, talk, and provide no more action, much to the complaint of the outer movie audience. Meanwhile the outer movie characters are playing out an action story that the inner movie characters are sometimes witnessing. It is primarily audience members in the outer movie who have "trouble with live humans" who are watching the inner movie avidly.

While it is natural for the inner movie to be black and white, given the time period, this plays directly into the meta-story being told of the perfection of Tom and the world he inhabits. The inner movie characters are impossibly clever and beautiful. Once Tom steps out of the movie, he gains color, but is still impossibly sweet, impossibly loyal and impossible to damage. By having Tom step out of the immutable world of black and white, Allen amplifies and highlights the predicament of the relationship between story telling artist and story hearing audience.  Each has their own view of reality that shadows the other. Tom says, "You're married and old-fashioned and I'm a whole new idea. The truth is, you're unhappily married." The implication is that Cecilia was married to the idea of her reality and should divorce herself from it. Tom is a projection of the artist, who is projecting his "new idea."

If the outer movie audience, including Cecilia, are seeking out the denial of their, as inner movie John put it, "...most human attribute [the] ability to choose..." then it follows that Allen is stating that it is important to keep a distance from the art and story you participate in, lest you lose sight of your humanity. The projection of the new idea is not enough to sustain a person in life outside of the story. Tom is attempting to break out of his character as written, but he is fated to be Tom Baxter and Cecilia recognizes this when she chooses Gil over Tom. Tom pleads with Cecilia, "Look, I love you, I know that only happens in movies." and indeed, it only happens within the inner movie Tom and not the outer movie Gil.