Job description: Woody Allen has a lot to answer for. The pint-sized, rheumy-eyed, cradle-snatching actor/director's on-screen versions of his neurotic self are always running off to the nearest couch for therapy.
Recently seen in: Ben Younger's Prime, starring Uma Thurman and Meryl Streep (right). Thurman plays a photographer going through a divorce and ensuing personal crisis, while Streep is a fussy, judgmental, control-freak of a therapist. When Thurman's character falls for a toyboy, the chasm in their ages sends her more frequently to the couch, and we wait for the inevitable twist. See if you can work it out for yourself.
Classics of the genre: Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal team up to excellent comedic effect in Analyse This (1999), which might best be summed up as 'Goodfellas on the couch'. They team up again in Analyse That, which can best be summed up as flogging a dead horse. Another excellent comic cast - Dan Aykroyd, Walter Matthau and Charles Grodin - didn't quite capture lightning in a bottle in Michael Ritchie's The Couch Trip (1988), but it's still an enjoyable romp as a rich and famous radio psychiatrist cracks up.
Woody Allen's Anything Else (2003) is a return to form in which he delves into the world of neurotics tying themselves in knots with their shrinks (and, thankfully, at the age of 67 he's spared us the unedifying vision of himself as romantic lead). For novelty value, check out Kelly Chen Wai-lam's wooden turn as a shrink in the otherwise excellent Infernal Affairs.
Ultimate avatar: Woody Allen's multi-Oscar winning Annie Hall (1977) weaves a magical tale around the premise that you have to like yourself before other people will like you. With all sorts of tricks such as split screens, animated characters and direct-to-camera narration, his character Alvy Singer, a gag writer for comedians who becomes a comic himself, falls for the whiter-than-white bread Annie Hall (Diane Keaton) while trying to come to terms with his many neuroses. In a classic split-screen scene, each is asked by their shrink whether they have sex often. Him: 'Hardly ever! Maybe three times a week.' Her: 'Constantly. I'd say three times a week.' Plus, there's a cameo by Christopher Walken at his weirdest.
Not to be confused with: Shrek; Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.
