Vanya on 42nd Street is a 1994 American comedy-drama film directed by Louis Malle, written by Andre Gregory, and starring Wallace Shawn and Julianne Moore. The film is an intimate, interpretive performance of the 1899 play Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekhov as adapted by David Mamet. Roger Ebert gave the film three-and-a-half out of four stars in his review for the Chicago Sun-Times. "As he did with My Dinner with Andre", Ebert wrote, "[Malle shows] he is the master of a visual style suited to tightly-encompassed material. There is not a shot that calls attention to itself, and yet not a shot that is without thought."

Year-end lists

  • 1st – Peter Rainer, Los Angeles Times
  • 2nd – Michael Mills, The Palm Beach Post
  • 3rd – Bob Strauss, Los Angeles Daily News
  • 5th – Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times
  • 7th – Gene Siskel, The Chicago Tribune
  • 9th – Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times
  • 9th – Robert Denerstein, Rocky Mountain News
  • Top 10 (listed alphabetically, not ranked) – Mike Clark, USA Today
  • Top 10 (not ranked) – Betsy Pickle, Knoxville News-Sentinel
  • Top 10 runner-ups (not ranked) – Janet Maslin, The New York Times
  • Honorable mention – Glenn Lovell, San Jose Mercury News
  • Honorable mention – William Arnold, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

References

  • Vanya on 42nd Street: An American Vanya an essay by Steven Vineberg at the Criterion Collection