Allen has always had difficulty harmonising his comic talents and the skittering form of his films: Manhattan is a temporary resolution gratefully received.

What George M. Cohan did with the Stars and Stripes in 1919, Allen is doing with neurosis in 1979: waving it, telling us that as long as we're proud of it, we're all pretty damned OK. That's the real romance of Manhattan.

A pretty and problematic picture that leaves a sour taste in the mouth.

Manhattan is a latter-day Modern Times with Allen as a Chaplin of the psyche. But in putting down cultural chic, it comes near to being what it satirises.