Neurotic he may be but at least he's learned to do what he does best and that's to make people laugh. So it's goodbye Kafka, hello "Hollywood Ending," a delightful movie with expert comic timing which, despite a few lines that fall flat or are even embarrassing (as when he calls his ring-pierced son by the same that the young man prefers), is a comic gem. While I was not amused by a comment from a young man in the story, "Critics are the lowest form of the culture," the movie is peppered by such bon mots as "Sex is better than talking. Just ask anyone here. Talking is what you have to suffer through to get to the sex." Amen.

Woody Allen performs in the role of Val Waxman, who, like Mr. Allen himself, has passed the high point of his career, but unlike the director needs to succeed in making a new movie or his career is over. Val is still very much in love with his ex-wife, Ellie (played by the stunning Tea Leoni, who has the bearing of Hillary Clinton but is much better looking), but Ellie, fed up dealing with her husband's hypochondria and adolescent needs has abandoned him to become engaged to the slick and handsome Hal (Treat Williams). Convincing Hal, the head of a studio, that he should bankroll his new work, "The City That Never Sleeps" with Val as director, she meets considerable opposition from the studio heads but ultimately, Hal agrees that Val's the best man for this particular job.

Serious trouble arises when Val develops a psychosomatic condition, hysterical blindness. Unable to see even from the first day of the shoot, Val enlists the aid of his principal confidant, his agent Al (Mark Rydell), determined to hide his condition lest he be fired on the spot, his entire life's career down the tubes. Much of the laughter from this story, yet another film about the making of a film, comes from Val's Fellini-esque attempts to fool everyone into thinking that his eyesight is a sound as his vision.

Woody Allen has assembled a terrific cast in small roles, particularly Peter Gerety as the psychiatrist who discovers the cause of the blindness; Mark Rydell, who could pass for Mel Brooks, as his trusted and loyal agent; and Mark Webber as Val's bandleader son Tony. The part of Lori, who plays Val's bimbo girlfriend in the relationship only to get a part in the movie is taken reasonably well by Debra Messing but Marisa Tomei would have been the top choice hands down.

As further indication that art follows life, Val insists that a foreigner be selected as photographer for the movie "The City That Never Sleeps," and lo, German cinematographer Wedigo von Schultzendorff has done a smashing job with "Hollywood Ending," making New York look as magnificent as Tea Leoni, particularly in a scene of the city as dusk as the sun sinks below the great Manhattan skyline. "Hollywood Ending" is an ode to New York, Woody Allen's favorite city, just the film that could revive the tourist industry here in the Big Apple. Given the title of Mr. Allen's movie, who do you think winds up honeymooning with Ellie: her ex-husband Val or her handsome and rich studio chief fiance Hal?