In my opinion a work of art should be interpreted and evaluated on its own merits, as a unit, without reference to the biography of the artist and changing moral standards.
Shadows and Fog is a fascinating work of art composed of serious philosophical reflection, silly gags, cultural references, and special visual effects.
The movie considers all the Big Questions: what is the nature of reality, what is the meaning of life, what is our role in the larger universe, what is love, how is it different from lust, what is the value of marriage and family, what is evil and what causes it, what is the nature of political oppression and how does it work, does God exist, and, finally, what is the value of art. Barely a frivolous word is spoken in the movie, yet it is full of silly gags, jokes you might hear in vaudeville or melodrama.
The plot is generated by the problem of Evil, here personified by a homicidal maniac stalking the streets on foggy nights, and several murders are depicted with artful detachment. Overcome by fear and distrustful of the police, citizens have formed a vigilante committee, and they insist that Everyman join their cause.
Allen, the director, plays the nebbishy Everyman; he has been called to action by the Vigilante committee to combat Evil, but he can't figure out what to do or where to go. He seeks his way through a vague and undefined world symbolized by dense fog and evocative shadows.
Mia Farrow is Everywoman, who can swallow swords if need be, but wants only to raise a family.
John Malkovich is the Artist, who speaks for the creative life, and feels threatened by the demands of a family. He is a Clown, and his art is comedy. He says, significantly, "Nothing is more frightening than trying to make people laugh, and failing."
In the plot, the Sword Swallower and the Clown are part of a circus, where everything is an act, everything is an illusion, and reality is irrelevant.
Lily Tomlin plays the Whore with Heart, disillusioned and jaded, but broad-minded and generous.
John Cusack plays the Smart Ass college student, who feels superior to everyone and doubts the value of everything.
In the plot, these two come together in a brothel, where Everyman and Everywoman also make an appearance. It is funny-ironic for characters to discuss love and marriage in a brothel.
One of the attractions of the movie is seeing so many well-known actors—a standard Hollywood ploy—in unusual guises.
David Ogden Stiers plays the Vigilante, who wakes Everyman from his sleep and demands that he join a plan to fight Evil, in the form of a maniac serial killer.
Jodie Foster has a bit as a whore with fetching ringlets.
Madonna plays a voluptuous acrobat.
Much of the acting seems exaggerated, like the acting in a melodrama, because the actors are not playing 'real' characters, but roles in an extended existential joke.
Julie Kavner delivers a hilarious monologue as the Jilted Bride, eager to see Everyman dead because he humiliated her.
The key role of the Magician is played by a lesser-known actor named Kenneth Mars.
In the plot, the Magician saves the day—or at least foils the immediate danger—through the power of illusion; he captures the villain through trickery, or so it seems.
For art lovers, a major attraction of the movie is the look, composed of artful set design, stagey lighting, and very tricky cinematography. Some of the shots seem impossible. In one, the view goes from a closeup of a selfish Bitch standing in a second story window, pulls out to include back views of Everyman and Everywoman, moves clear around those two characters, and back up to the close-up in the window, without a cut. In another scene, the camera is in the center of a circle of Whores—talking about the role of illusion in creating sexual satisfaction—panning mechanically around, sometimes showing faces close-up, sometimes showing the woodwork and windows, just panning democratically around and around until Everywoman starts her lines, then it settles into extreme close-up, and our whirling feeling settles into attention.
Without getting into specifics, the score consists of clips of existing recordings. The music is circusy, discordant, old-fashioned, clanky. The melodies sound familiar but somehow off, inharmonious. This contributes to the carnival / whorehouse atmosphere, and the feeling that nothing is what it seems to be.
So, what is the meaning of all this melodramatic confusion? In the end the Artist discovers that family can be more satisfying than creativity, and so he agrees to settle down with Everywoman and make a family. Everyman finds his way at last by doing the thing he really loves. He apprentices himself to the Magician, ready to follow him at any price. Magic is defined as creating illusions, and symbolizes all the arts. If the universe is by nature chaotic and meaningless, the role of art is to make sense of things, to impose a temporary sense of order. Magic and Art satisfy the soul's quest for understanding and direction.
