Woody Allen has released a film (or two) pretty much every single year since 1970. That's four decades of him producing films, and when I saw Annie Hall I thought that I would never see a film from him that I would find superior. About thirty minutes into Hannah and Her Sisters I knew that I was dead wrong. This is an all out masterpiece and without a doubt in my mind one of the greatest films ever made. Finding a film loaded with more finely crafted characters is a relatively impossible task, as far as I'm concerned. Every single one is filled with complex, human emotion and experiences from the main characters like Michael Caine's and Barbara Hershey's all the way down to more supporting characters like Max von Sydow's and Carrie Fisher's. Everyone in the cast nails Allen's expert writing, creating characters who are unique and commanding without ever being annoying or overstaying their welcome. Allen makes expert use of title cards to introduce each chunk of the story and does a great job of splitting time between everyone, never having one outstay their welcome or making the audience feel as if we didn't see enough of a character.

What I found most remarkable though was how well I related to each character. There wasn't a single character who stuck out to me as being more relatable than the others because each one had something in them that I related to on such a primal level. I really don't think I've seen a film more tuned into my person, where each character had something where I instinctively thought, "That's me". From Michael Caine's awkward charm with the woman he loves to Barbara Hershey's deep depression and guilt to Dianne Wiest's self-loathing to Mia Farrow's need to take care of the people she loves without saying how she really feels to Max von Sydow's hatred of everyone in the world to Woody Allen's hypochondria and general views on the world (I always find myself relating very strongly to the characters he played outside of his very Jewishness). A true masterpiece of cinema. Something that I can only see myself loving more and more as I see it again and again.