proud_luddite In a Los Angeles suburb, Mabel (Gena Rowlands) is a stay-at-home Mom married to Nick (Peter Falk) who works in construction and has good friendships with his colleagues. During the film, Mabel shows signs of mental instability that eventually lead to a breakdown.If one word could be used to describe this film, it would be "raw". It is broken into three sections: Mabel's reaction when weekend plans with Nick are thwarted; the breakdown scene; and a return from the mental hospital. In all scenes, superbly directed by John Cassavetes, the ensemble acting is brilliant.Rowlands is perfect as the central character. Whether her mental illness is in remission or she is dangerously unstable, she is always believable in a very difficult role. What is equally amazing is the reaction of others to her troubled ways whether they be immediate family, extended family, friends, or strangers. Their awkwardness and discomfort are so real that such scenes can potentially remind one of similar incidents in one's own past.Rowlands' greatness is met by Falk whose character, like others, also lose stability in reaction to Mabel's condition. Katherine Cassavetes as Nick's mother, also gives a praiseworthy performance.This is one of those special films that could generate much discussion and thought afterward. One possible question is whether Nick is the mentally unstable one (aided by his mother) causing Mabel to fall apart. It was also ahead of its time with its depiction of mental illness and the collective response of "the elephant in the living room".It may seem long at two and a half hours but for those willing to see it to the end, the reward is plentiful.OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT: Directing by John Cassavetes

Scuba Girl First of all - enough with the trivializing "oh, of course a woman in this situation would go crazy". Mabel is mentally ill. Mental illness had more of a stigma in 1974 than 40+ years later, yet that doesn't diminish the impact of the movie or accolades of Rowlands' masterful performance. We respect Mabel for who she is - we sympathize with her. The strong performances of Rowland and Falk make for an engrossing film.The camera sits there and lets the scene happen, and what comes out is a gritty, realistic-looking piece of cinematographic history.

lasttimeisaw Fresh to Cassavetes' canon, A WOMAN UNDER THE INFLUENCE is tiresome and exhausting for my first-time viewing, throughout the entire running time (155 minutes), we watch a series of intense clashes between Mabel (Gena Rowlands) and Nick (Peter Falk), sometimes catalyzed by their family members or close friends, and the repercussions includes Mabel exacerbates her mental disability and the collateral damage to their 3 young children. Using intimate and irregular camera-work to demonstrate a fly-on-the-wall authenticity opens a maximum door for thespians to show off their superlative working-class liberation of feelings and emotion, Gena Rowlands, immerses into her character with optimum dexterity, from her quirks of sputtering and word-mouthing, the fervid and persistent advocacy of opera aria to the time-bomb of her squeamish frailty, we never know when will she explode, whilst time is ticking and the wait is taxing both for the players and the spectators. She also shines in her warmer facet during the heartwarming episodes with her kids. Mabel is a dream role any actress would be ever craving for, Rowlands is the performer nonpareil for her concentrated and committed dedication of embodiment without falling into the pitfall of borderline OTT. Falk, a flawless pick for an ordinary blue-collar, bedeviled by his wife's unhinged nature and stumped by the futile and consuming communication, improperly catches the worst moment to throw a surprise party for Mabel, his quandary could be easier to be related by the audiences, besides, his trademark out-of-focus eyes betray his frustration and it is certainly the situation is at his wits' end. This tiny budgeted film is a family workshop, kinfolks and friends constitutes the cast, e.g. both Cassavete's mother Katherine and Rowlands' mother Lady plays the in-laws in the film. Overall the film is a challenging project which unflinchingly debunks the underbelly of the marital bond, "till death us do apart" is so harrowing to listen under this circumstance. During the conjugal tug-of-war, Cassavetes pluckily interposes their children into the game, at the eleventh hour, it is the kids' relentless endeavor thaws the edginess induced by the heavy volley of laborious squabbles. Finally I must bellyache about the befuddling time-line, when Mabel brings a stranger to her house at night, it is the next morning Nick and his workmates come back from working, they have an unpleasant midday dinner, then it is the morning after Mabel's mother brings the children to home before school, right? Then how come later Nick's mother accusing Mabel for adultery at "last night"? Help me out here, it does bugs me, otherwise it is an indeed unique film of its own kind, although it doesn't gratify my satisfaction thanks to the frivolous and dreary altercations, I am always coveting for a bit more from the story plainly extracted from the lifelike experience, other than accentuates the tedious and irksome sensory overkill, it would be nicer if a sensible approach could lead us to a palliative nostrum to set our cerebral phase back to a normal state.

Artimidor Federkiel "A Woman Under the Influence" - like other Cassavetes films - is a difficult one to put into any specific drawer. Which is a good thing as it is able to push different buttons for different people and keeps the viewer on the edge of their seat and actively involved throughout. Not in the Hollywood kind of way, mind you, full with overblown drama, enhanced with musical cues and a heart-warming love story at the core, but rather in a way that makes you care, feel that it matters, that gets under your skin as a person, not just as a movie consumer. The main reasons why the film is so engaging and absorbing lies in the fact that it draws from convincingly portrayed lives rooted in a Seventies reality, the lives of a blue collar husband and a housewife with two kids. It's a familiar constellation with the ordinary domestic mayhem between troubles, challenges and duties, the need to show emotions and to suppress them at the same time, and there's always the urge to escape. It all comes down to a life on the edge, where people as partners in marriage are trapped in the confines of their everyday existence.On the surface "A Woman Under the Influence" is about a woman going mad and people in her environment having to deal with it. But thanks to the characterisations of Gena Rowlands (Cassavete's wife in the part of Mabel Longhetti) and Peter Falk (as her husband Nick) a rather simple story like this gets complex and multi-layered. Cassavetes delivers cinéma vérité the way it is meant to be. The film shamelessly shows us our fears, the emotional abysses between people, confronts us with the resulting traumas, all based on the influences we have on each other. It makes us suffer with both protagonists and their efforts, their eventual helplessness to deal with the situation, to find the common ground of the relationship. And in a struggle things go overboard. "Will you please stand up for me?" Mabel asks in one crucial scene, and if we don't judge first but listen, we might also hear what she's trying to say.