Annie Hall to the camera, or launch into inspired monologues like Annie's free-association as she describes her family to Alvy. This speech by Diane Keaton is as close to perfect as such a speech can likely be ... all done in one take of brilliant brinksmanship." He cites a study that calculated the average shot length of "Annie Hall" to be 14.5 seconds, while other films made in 1977 had an average shot length of 4–7 seconds. Peter Cowie suggests that "Allen breaks up his extended shots with more orthodox cutting back and forth in conversation pieces, so that the forward momentum
Annie Hall box office hit. It was first released on Blu-ray on January 24, 2012 alongside Allen's 1979 film "Manhattan". Both releases include the films' original theatrical trailers. "Annie Hall" was met with widespread critical acclaim upon its release. Tim Radford of "The Guardian" called the film "Allen's most closely focused and daring film to date". "The New York Times"' Vincent Canby preferred "Annie Hall" to Allen's second directorial effort, "Take the Money and Run", since the former is more "humane" while the latter is more a "cartoon". Several critics have compared the film favorably to Bergman's "Scenes from a Marriage" (1973),