eric262003 It's six in the evening an introverted young lady names Jessie Cates (Sissy Spacek) asks her mother Thelma (Anne Bancroft) where her father's where her father left his gun. Not feeling threatened by this young lady's strange request, Thelma tells her. Jessie is middle-aged person whose life has been in utter turmoil. Her husband abandoned her and drug addicted son has vanished, Jessie is now living back at her mother's house and things have been very settling until that particular evening. Thelma catches on later that the reason Jessie asked her for his gun is to lock herself into her room and to end her life after the night has cleared. Thelma stays strong and does everything she can to persuade her daughter into not committing such an act.Based on the Pulitzer-Prize winning play by Marsha Norman, the theatrical integrity speaks volumes and due to being low budget, scenery and settings are frugally limited. Almost 90% of the film is situated in the small house but the scope of the film depends on dialogue and hopes that Jessie does not commit an act she might regret before it's too late, and to hope Thelma tries to help her from doing it. There are a few flaws in "'night Mother", but the performances are quite remarkable. Spacek is someone a person could relate to and her emotions are very real. Bancroft was just as wonderful as Thelma and her struggle to keep her daughter from suicide is purely heroic. The script by Miss Norman succeeds as she keeps her characters in fine tune and keeping it in their living quarters as the intensity manifests progresses when the mother and daughter move around. The body language is quite believable and very convincing. The cinematography by Stephen Katz can be a bit spontaneous at times that avoids making this film acceptable when really it should have been more restrained knowing as to what the social issues that is being dealt with. It may seem very frugal, but the meager score is actually very effective. The score is just a simple acoustic guitar demo from the beginning of the movie and when the film wraps up in the end. This is good because it does not overlap with the scintillating dialogue and the subliminal body language and it refrains itself from adding violins which would have ruined the atmosphere. It's actually very easy to follow as there are no confusing flashbacks or any jumping to scenes abruptly. It all happens in one period of time which is a distraction to the bad cinematography. The subject of suicide can be a really tough subject to handle and the controversy that goes with it can be quite overwhelming at times. This movie had a lot of things going for it, but the faults in this movie were very flabbergasting as well. The pacing was way too slow and I don't have a short attention span. The stage-to-screen formatting was poorly executed (could be because of limited budget). However, it is the acting from Spacek and Bancroft that is the real reason this movie does stand out.

gftbiloxi Written for the stage by Marsha Norman, 'NIGHT, MOTHER opened on Broadway in 1983 with Anne Pitoniak and Kathy Bates in the roles of Thelma and Jessie Cates. It proved a stunning success with critics and audiences alike, running 380 performances, receiving the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, a Tony award for Best Play, and Tony nominations for Pitoniak, Bates, and director Tom Moore.In 1986 Marsha Norman herself adapted the play to film. The roles of Thelma and Jessie went to Anne Bancroft and Sissy Spacek, and in the process of writing--and possibly under pressure from producers--Norman expanded the original play to include characters mentioned but never seen. The result was something slightly less than ideal. Spacek is perfectly cast as the suicidal Jessie, but although she gives an excellent performance Bancroft is intrinsically miscast in the role of Jessie's "plain country woman" mother. The expansion of the original story also has the effect of diluting the claustrophobic intensity of the original. As for director Tom Moore, although his work for the play was memorable, his work with the film was unremarkable.But unexpectedly, such is the power of the story's basic premise that these flaws hardly matter. Watered down, fiddled with, and somewhat miscast, 'NIGHT, MOTHER is still a knock-you-flat story that raises the sort of questions that keep you awake on a sleepless night. Thelma is an ordinary, uneducated woman who takes life as it comes; Jessie, however, is an uneasy mixture of introspection and uncertainty, a woman whose marriage failed when she developed epilepsy, whose son has become a bit of gutter trash, who has over the years become a recluse in her mother's home. She's tired of the whole thing, and on this particular evening she informs her mother that in a few hours she's going to shoot herself and put an end to it.Like the play, the film is essentially an emotional explosion between the two women, Jessie spelling out her reasons for her suicide, Thelma working to turn Jessie from it. Although the suspense of the film arises from a "Will she do it or not?" situation, the real interest here is in Jessie's motivations, the how and why of her decision, and the tactics that Thelma uses in an effort to bring Jessie's plans to a grinding halt, and the way they battle each other over the course of the film. The interest is in the characters, plain and simple.As noted, Bancroft is not ideally cast here. It is extremely difficult to accept her in the role of Thelma Cates. Even so, Bancroft gives it all she has--and the end result is quite powerful as acting pure and simple, a remarkable feat. But the real powerhouse here is Spacek: we believe her, never question her in the role, and buy into it from start to finish. Even with Bancroft's miscasting, the dilution of the play, and the uninspired direction, Spacek's performance is more than enough to render the film powerful, memorable.This is not a film that I casually recommend. It rather depends on the viewer's life experiences, and I would hardly send it off to a person in a depressed state of mind or one who had a suicide in the family. But it is worth the trouble it takes to seek out, particularly if it leads you on to reading the play itself--or better yet, seeing a stage production of the same.GFT, Amazon Reviewer

hillguy I can't think of any better choices that could do justice to this heart touching view into painful lives. A mother and daughter spends one last day talking about their lives and how one comes to the conclusion that she has nothing to live for. Her life has been nothing but pain and disappointment so, she has decided to stop the pain. From her own health to the pain and disappointment of her life to a mother, without a real clue, that her children are caught up in depressing and painful lives. How do you convince your child who, so matter of fact, has decided life is just too painful and has set into motion a way to stop the pain. A powerful piece of writing and acting culminates in a memorable film and performances by two very talented actresses. I have looked for this film for years and could not find it. Stellar performances and a must see hankie experience.

Rosemary (zelda1964) What I gather from this film,was that Thelma(Bancroft)was blind to the pain and hurt Jessie(Spacek) felt within.There was nothing she could do to rectify the situation. The self-pitying Jessie was bent on suicide, and she had reason to believe the World was never going to change.It seemed that she was punishing herself, and felt responsible for the way her Life and Family turned out.I believe that Thelma tried to be a good mother. She did not want epilepsy to be a hindrance to young Jessie's fun and social atmosphere.Wouldn't any parent try to make her child blend in and fit with the rest of the crowd? The movie keeps the viewer on the edge; You wonder how low a person can go before he sees a "light" and gets back up again.