By the time that Anything Else was released in 2003, Woody Allen was in something of a rut. His previous three films saw him following a very similar pattern, making film after film after film in which he starred as a hapless, down on his luck guy who gets caught up in a caper beyond his control, with each film feeling a little more tired and strained than the last. While Anything Else didn't exactly set the world alight ten years ago - it received much the same mixed response that his other contemporary films had - in retrospect it looks like a much more interesting picture, if only because it marked a clear change from the kind of films he had been making. It might not have done much to reverse the consensus opinion that he was in a slump, but it does mark the point at which he seemed to start pushing himself again.