Woody Allen film starring Mia Farrow as Cecilia, a movie-loving waitress in Depression-era smalltown New Jersey. Her husband (Danny Aiello) is an unemployed layabout who treats her badly and sometimes beats her. She escapes her dreary life by going to the movies, sometimes watching the same picture over and over again. One particular film, The Purple Rose of Cairo, catches her imagination. She is so lost day-dreaming about the movie world that she is sacked from her job. When watching the picture for the fifth time, one of the characters, Tom Baxter (Jeff Daniels), steps out of the movie and into the "real" world, having noticed Cecilia in the audience, and runs away with her. This causes an uproar. The cinema manager (Irving Metzman) calls Raoul Hirsh (Alexander Cohen), the film's producer, who then puts pressure on Gil Shepherd (also played by Jeff Daniels), the actor who played Tom Baxter, to find the Tom Baxter who has escaped and get him to go back on screen. Both Tom and Gil fall in love with Cecilia. She has to choose between a perfect fictional person, or the real world.
Nugget: an intriguing scenario that is executed with a light touch. Another one of Allen's period films, capturing the power of the movies as a form of escapism during the 1930s. Quirky stuff. Woody Allen doesn't act in this one.
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