Annie Hall

Alvy: Well, I don’t know what I did wrong. I mean, I cant believe this. Somewhere she cooled off to me! Is it-Is it something that I did?

Woman on the Street: Its never something you do. Thats how people are. Love fades.

Annie Hall is one of those films that linger in the mind because of the classic one-liners. Lines in this film are a fine blend of wit and philosophy. The above quotation is a very typical example of that.

'Its never something you do. That's how people are. Love fades.' All of us have grown up on books, fables and movies glorifying eternal love. Woody Allen here says to us something that is very contrary to that. Had he let the line be said grimly by a broken hearted person, weeping on screen, it would have evoked hardly any emotion. Instead he does it in the classic Allen way, he lets a 'Woman on the Street' say it. A woman who is just passing by and stops to answer Alvy, seemingly understanding his troubles in a trice. That works.