You’re too young to remember “Cleopatra,” the 1963 movie that cost so much and lost so much that it literally almost destroyed 20th Century Fox. Of course, last year Fox was sold to Disney and doesn’t exist anymore. But “Cleopatra,” you could say, is where it all began.

The film starred the hottest movie stars of the day, Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, who became a couple and the top tabloid subjects of all time when they left their spouses for each other. Meantime, Fox — which almost went bankrupt– sold most of their property, thus creating Century City in West Los Angeles. That’s how bad things were. (I miss the old Century City mall.)

So why not make it again? Paramount, ironically run by Jim Giannopolous, a former head of 20th (more recently, not in 1963) has won an auction to take a new crack at Cleo with the “Wonder Woman” team. Patty Jenkins will direct her Wonder Woman, Gal Gadot, as Queen of the Nile. Who will play Mark Antony? Chris Pine? I don’t think so, but you never know these days.

In the original, Julius Caesar was inhabited by Rex Harrison, who was then only 55. Is it time for Daniel Day Lewis to come out of retirement? Stephen Dillane sound good? Can Mark Rylance play every part in the movie? Time will tell.

It should be meaningful that the auction went to Paramount, and not to Warner Bros. where Jenkins and Gadot have had their successes. Also, Disney, which owns Fox, won’t be revisiting their good old days.

Now this is something to look forward to!

Michelle Pfeiffer cocks her head back imperiously as Frances Price, a once wealthy, still gorgeous widow, in “French Exit,” and pulls into second place behind Frances McDormand in the coming race for Best Actress at the Oscars. Someone wrote that it’s a light year for contenders in that category, but with Jennifer Hudson, Kate Winslet, and maybe Halle Berry possibly on the list, this is a high compliment.

That’s because Pfeiffer’s performance is so unexpected in a comedy termed “surreal” and edgy that begins in question and blossoms into something unique and memorable. First of all, to think that Michelle Pfeiffer is 62 years old makes no sense because she looks maybe 42. Did she ever age? Or was is just that after her big run from 1988 to 1992 (three Oscar nominations) she turned down her celebrity volume and got very zen?

“French Exit” was a 2018 novel by Canadian author Patrick deWitt, who wrote the screenplay for the movie. He also wrote the novel, “The Sisters Brothers” that was turned into a big flop of a movie, so I was a little nervous as “French Exit” proceeded that we’d be in trouble. And really for the first half of this film, directed by Azazel Jacobs, I wasn’t quite sure we were going to make it. Pfeiffer’s co-stars are Lucas Hedges, looking like Wes Anderson, as her laconic son, Malcolm, Imogen Poots as Malcolm’s older and impatient girlfriend, a Canadian actress named Susan Coyne, as Joan (who is maybe Frances’s wealthy, wise, and plain sister); and a black cat — yes– a black cat, who is more than he appears to be.

And there’s one more actor in this gang: Valerie Mahaffey, who has been chipping away year by year at mostly a television career, with an Emmy win and a Daytime Emmy nomination. She plays Madame Reynaud, an American ex pat with money who nearly steals the film and gets herself a Best Supporting Actress slot almost effortlessly. Mahaffey is an overnight sensation at age 67 (and also looking much younger).

If you don’t know deWitt’s novel (I didn’t) you don’t know what you’re waiting for. So when Frances is advised she’s broke and must sell everything, Joan — these people are RICH — tells her to go stay in her spare apartment in Paris. As you do. Frances seems barely attached to reality. Instead of getting on a cheap flight to Charles DeGaulle, she and Malcolm set sail in separate state rooms on an expensive cruise liner. They bring their black cat, who is clearly more than just a house pet, and we find out later is named for Frances’s late husband and Malcolm’s father, Frank (played stiffly by Tracy Letts).

On the cruise, they meet a medium named Madeleine with special talents played Danielle McDonald, who is also great this season as rock critic Lillian Roxon in “I Am Woman.” How Madeleine is on the cruise, how Little Frank the cat, passes customs, all of this is a mystery that kicks the second half of the film into something you now realize is quite different than the set up, and 100 times more enjoyable.

Among the things that happen is that Frances becomes a little like Aurora Greenaway from “Terms of Endearment.” A group of eccentric people are now attracted to her situation like metal shavings to a magnet. It’s no longer just her and Malcolm as the camera draws back to reveal a group that gathers for no apparent reason except possibly a missing cat. And that seems to be enough for director Jacobs to pull off a satisfying, surprise success. You realize that with this film, with “Nomadland,” and “The Father,” that 2020 isn’t a lost movie year* at all. It was just a slow starter.

(*PS I left out “The Trial of the Chicago 7,” “The King of Staten Island,” “Da 5 Bloods,” “Greyhound,” “The Outpost,” and “Rainy Day in New York.”)

I originally wrote this review in August 2019. I stand by it now. No one else is reviewing this movie, they’re reviewing their feelings about Woody Allen, which are largely based on falsehoods.

Go see this movie or see it when it streams. Everyone who sees it loves it.

Woody Allen’s “Rainy Day in New York” opens the Deauville Film Festival next Friday. It opens around the world this fall, but still has no distributor in America thanks to some very narrow thinking.

I saw it this morning, and I was relieved to discover that “Rainy Day” is funny, witty, and charming, very sweet in many ways. Contrary to planted stories in the press last year, there are no inappropriate relations between a young girl and an older man. Indeed, the main characters, who are romantically involved, are all young and quite appropriate. They are played — wonderfully — by Timothee Chalamet, Elle Fanning, and Selena Gomez. I feel bad for Chalamet. He was induced into denouncing Woody last year for no reason. In his young career, this is one of Chalamet’s best performances, as good as in “Call Me By Your Name.” He should be writing Woody a thank you note.

“Rainy Day” takes place in Woody’s New York– upscale, wealthy, beautifully appointed. Chalamet plays Gatsby, a college kid from a very rich Upper East Side family with an older, successful brother and and much older parents. Tony winner Cherry Jones is his mother, a socialite and then some, who has a jaw dropping scene toward the end of the film that merits acclaim on all levels.

Gatsby is not much of a student. He’s been kicked out of one Ivy League school, and he’s failing Yardley, a small liberal arts college. He comes into New York with his girlfriend, Ashleigh, played by Fanning, who is at once naive about the adult world and urban life, but savvy enough about sex and relationships. She’s on the cusp. The two of them are child like adults who know everything and nothing at the same time. They are also in a fable. “Rainy Day” takes place in a heightened reality, it is not meant to be reality. (I do think a couple of early reviewers didn’t get this.) Gatsby and Ashleigh are like Alfalfa and Darla in formal wear.

Ashleigh goes off to interview a famous director named Roland Pollard (Liev Schreiber), who’s suffering ennui after making what he calls a “70 million dollar pile of stinking shit.” Gatsby goes on a bildungsroman day of adventure in the city while he waits for her. Among the people he encounters is Gomez, playing the younger sister of a girl he dated in high school. They have instant chemistry. Gomez is a revelation.

The set up is nice because Woody sends these two young lovers off in separate directions, only to return to each other, sort of. Together, Chalamet and Fanning are lovely, and funny, like a younger Alvy Singer and Annie Hall. But apart they are so strong that they can carry their own loads through the movie. Their stories are nice parallels because they each think they are world-weary and so knowledgeable, and yet they have a lot to learn.

What you will notice is that Gatsby, Ashleigh, and Shannon don’t talk like young people on MTV or in teen movies. They are educated, wise, and Salinger-esque. Again, this is heightened reality. They may remind you a little of the kids in Whit Stillman’s “Metropolitan.” Woody may have picked up their speech patterns from his own daughters’ (he has two college age girls with wife Soon Yi) friends. Gatsby only really knows the Upper East Side world: the art, museums, charities, stores, foreign films, literature, etc. He’s obsessed with old movies and old music. He can play the piano, and at one point he sits down at one and sings the jazz standard, “Everything Happens to Me,” so disarmingly, it reminded me of Diane Keaton singing “Seems Like Old Times” in “Annie Hall.”

So how would Gatsby, who’s maybe 21, know this song and all these old movies? (He references a lot of them.) Again, this is a fable, and the more you learn about his odd-duckiness, the more you accept it. He’s not putting it on. And Chalamet is utterly believable selling this idea. Gatsby is an old soul. I can’t imagine one teenage girl missing that scene of him at the piano. Woody has also made him– a very smart character point– a gambler, an adept and successful poker player who is sort of his own Molly Bloom. If thee were a sequel, he’d be going to jail with Helly Nahmad.

“Rainy Day” is full of jokes and good laughs, throw away one liners, and meaningful Woody observations. “The city has its own agenda” is one that New Yorkers will identify with thoroughly. I also loved “Time flies. Unfortunately, it flies coach.” Gatsby tells Shannon this mother’s parties are like “a farrago of plutocrats,” to which she replies, “that sounds like something in a fusion restaurant.” Diego Luna’s movie star character is described as having “set himself on fire to protest climate change.”

There’s really good work from the supporting cast, as usual, including Liev Schreiber as RP (Roman Polanski? No…), Jude Law as a cuckolded producer (he and Rebecca Hall have a hilarious argument outside an apartment building), plus Suki Waterhouse, Griffin Newman, Annaleigh Ashford, Will Rogers, and Kathryn Leigh Scott. Vittorio Storraro’s buttery cinematography warms every scene. And Santo Loquasto’s sets are something out a Fifth Avenue fantasy, you’ve never seen homes like these. And you never will, except here.

Unlike some of Woody’s films since “Blue Jasmine,” his last major film (there have been four– Wonder Wheel, Magic in the Moonlight, Cafe Society, and Irrational Man), “Rainy Day” is a full structure, three act play that’s completely focused and satisfying. I remember Hamish Linklaker singing and strumming the guitar in “Magic in the Moonlight”– it was a good idea, but didn’t work. Now it’s reborn here and they pull it off. What can you do? “Rainy Day” is a romantic movie with a happy ending and no end of sly fun. Americans will love it. Put it in theaters, someone, please.