has anyone tried marathoning his movies?

Thank you, my friend.

I don't think a good artist can help but repeat (to some extent), because of course the artist will have things that prey upon or are bound up in their soul. Those things are bound to come out - if they're putting their soul into their art. If they aren't, well, they're probably not an artist worth investigating.

Woody is no different. And, fortunately, his topics sustain forever. He could make a movie really interested in love (not just "romance movies", but *about* love) every year and never have that well run dry. The proof is that artists have been putting out works on love forever and it's never gotten old.

That's probably the first time anybody's ever compared WA to PKD, and now I'm hoping Allen does an adaptation of something by Philip, if only for the tagline: "WOODY DOES DICK!"

The other thing about Allen is that, while he goes to the same wells, he does it differently, and there are a lot of wells. Stage magic comes up a lot (including hypnosis), but he uses it in different ways. Colin Firth in Magic in the Moonlight, for instance, is a classic stage magician and a skeptic, while David Ogden Stiers in Curse of the Jade Scorpion is a hypnotist of an exaggerated nature, with powers unlikely to be found in real life. Then, of course, he does magic for real in films like Midnight in Paris, The Purple Rose of Cairo, or Alice.

And all that is just one thing he does sometimes, let alone existentialism or writer-as-character, or an investigation of nostalgia (Radio Days, Midnight in Paris), or his biggest one: love.

We haven't touched on his cinematography, either, which is underrated. People just think it's nothing special, like he just kinda "shoots movies" with no real style, but he's got (first of all) a lot of variety here, and I'd argue that there is a greatness to an unassuming cinematography.

Camera moves of the slick nature draw attention to themselves. This is masterfully done by Martin Scorsese or (most-known) Tarantino. I love those filmmakers.

Allen's the other end of the spectrum where you seldom notice what he's doing with the camera, but what he's doing is majestic.

I've discussed with people before about the "peeping Tom" camerawork in Manhattan Murder Mystery, turning us into spies. It even stays more static and controlled in scenes that are more laid-back and gets more jittery and twitchy when Diane Keaton is snooping around. We become sleuths by watching and prying into lives. Of course, the handheld "real" style also suits the heart-and-core of that film: will Allen and Keaton's characters' marriage fall apart or get stronger? It stays human but also imitates spying. Genius.

He uses mockumentary stuff in Zelig, knows when to employ black-and-white photography, and can mimic the old styles to give us a feeling of "Old Hollywood" in Curse of the Jade Scorpion. He isn't just a mimic, either (which Tarantino might want to take note of). He doesn't just do Fellini, he adds his own thing to Stardust Memories. His mimicry of epic cinematography in Love and Death is cheeky - a puckish spoof, if you will, and heightens the laughs (assuming you've seen epic cinema enough to notice).

His camerawork, though, by lacking "force" and never imposing itself, kinda strikes me like a well-air-conditioned room. A good air conditioner keeps a room cool. A good heater will make the room warm and cozy. But with perfect temperature control, you might never even notice it's there at all.

Sometimes, yes, but sometimes no, and taken to their extremes, either way can make the viewpoint meaningless. For example, arguing that the essence of the movie or story is what matters might wind up saying somebody who has seen Grease need not see a production of Romeo & Juliet despite the latter having its own value.

But, yes, I see your point.

Still, I would argue that we see a filmmaker with a lot of breadth and depth to his works, which are not all alike, nor are they exhausting and repetitive.

Annie Hall and Manhattan were made only a couple years apart and each deals with a Woody Allen-played main character and his love life turmoils, but they are very different movies. Manhattan almost pretends to be a comedy - mostly relying on its dramatic points to move the story - while Annie Hall is almost absurdist in its comedic approach. Watch both in a row, and despite similar themes and ideas, somewhere between the straightforward narrative of Manhattan contrasted with the bouncing, stream-of-consciousness approach to Annie Hall; or the characters themselves; or even the black-and-white vs colour presentation, and neither would be dull having viewed the other.

But, okay, themes? We still have a wide spread.
Bananas - just enough politics to float a spoof film
Love and Death - what it says on the tin
Crimes & Misdemeanours - an examination of consequences (or lack thereof) and what nihilism might mean
Midnight in Paris - the wistful "what if" of nostalgia and living in the present
Match Point - luck and chaos

He does (as I admit/said before) use death, love, God, romance, sex, neuroticism, New York lifestyles, Jewish-American identity, and so on and so forth, as his go-to themes and ideas, but that's not all he's explored, he explores them in radically different ways, and these topics are inexhaustibly deep.

I know what you mean: Allen often has a similar vibe. But I still stand by my two main points:

First, that a marathon or day-by-day viewing of his films would not produce boredom because of their excellence.

Second, that he has more depth and variety than people give him credit for.