Even Woody Allen and Diane Keaton seem to be struggling at times for laughs in this eccentric comic sideshoot from War and Peace. As the film, set in Russia in 1812, opens, Allen, a Russian peasant ('I'm a perfect fit for clothes - I'm a 28 dwarf'), is about to be executed - at 6 am. 'I'm supposed to go at five,' he confides. 'but I got leniency.' But the sprinkling of verbal gems is, for this stage of Allen's career, somewhat sparser than usual, set-up comedy situations few and far between and build-up gags non-existent. We did, though, like Keaton's words to her dying husband - 'I could have made love with you more often - like once, for instance' - and Allen's own comment on death: 'There are worse things. If you've ever spent an evening with an insurance salesman you'll know what I mean.'


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