ABSTRACT
Marshall McLuhan, Canada's pre-eminent media-theory explorer, raising and addressing historical and contemporary issues of and relationships among media and technology, society and culture, and approached his material and his audience not only as a professor of English literature but also as a modernist literary artist/performer. During the late 1920s and early 1930s, a number of high-modernist writers constructed their interpretations of what were for them visible and identifiable features in the social and physical behaviour of moviegoers. In an art-house lobby such as the New Yorker's cinephiles and aficionados and other movie enthusiasts participate comfortably in what is typically a relaxing atmosphere. This chapter explores McLuhan-at-the-movies within the movie Annie Hall and, in light of literary modernists' interest in moviegoing, considers possible interpretations of that historic moment. Woody Allen, on the other hand, loved Bergman, perhaps had even thought of him for what became the 'McLuhan" role in Annie Hall, just as he had certainly thought of Buñuel.
