606. The Killing of a Chinese Bookie

The Killing of a Chinese Bookie
1976
Directed by John Cassavetes

Wait, is this a John Cassavetes film that I actually like.  It can't be...

Cosmo Vitelli owes money to the mafia (with a name like that, it's kind of expected).  He agrees to perform a hit on a rival, but the target might be bigger than he anticipated.  It's a very simple story, but it still took Cassavetes over two hours to tell it in his original cut, according to some online digging I did.  Apparently, once it was received poorly, Cassavettes reedited it to be 108 minutes.  I don't have a lot of respect for a director who needs hours and hours of our time to tell a basic story.

I suppose I did end up liking this, mostly because it felt like a Martin Scorsese movie pretending to be directed by someone else. I did find the ending to be rather cliche at this point.  I might need to amend my spoiler rule so I don't always have to end with vague statements like that.

RATING: ***--

Interesting Facts:

One of the few John Cassavetes movies that do not feature his wife Gena Rowlands.

582. A Woman Under the Influence

A Woman Under the Influence
Directed by John Cassavetes
1974

I am sorry I haven't posted in awhile! I will be living in London for a little while and have been settling in.  Maybe now that I am in England my opinions will match Ray's more!  Although I will never hate musicals, no matter what he says.

I don't even want to waste too much time with this movie.  A woman slowly (very, very slowly) descends into madness.  I had strep throat while I was watching this and I swear it raised my fever.  This was one of the most obnoxious films I have ever seen.  A husband and wife scream at each other for two and a half hours.  It makes the couple in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf look like two lovebirds.

Apparently Richard Dreyfuss found the experience of watching the film so "harrowing" that he vomited.  My illness took a different form but the moral is clear: avoid or risk your personal health.

RATING: *----

Interesting Facts:

Gena Rowlands and John Cassavetes were married in real life.

481. Faces

Faces
1968
Directed by John Cassavetes

After traveling through film to quite a few different countries, we finally land in Pretentiousguay.  Watching a film that was desperately trying to be a Godard for over two hours was absolutely exhausting.

A middle-aged couple's marriage is clearly disintegrating and we have to watch them awkwardly interact with other people.  An alternate title for this was "Every Dinner Party I Have Ever Attended".

I believe that if you are going to use the cinema verite style, your movie should not be over two hours.  I mean, that gets a little dull for even the most exciting films.  I even love to listen to dialogue, but none of it was that compelling.  I just wanted to tell everyone to shut up and let the lawyers do their thing.

Just incredibly dull and boring.  Skip it!

RATING: **---

Interesting Facts:

Steve Buscemi's favorite film.

346. Shadows

Shadows
1959
Directed by John Cassavetes

I was dreading writing this review because, frankly, I have no idea what happened.  I paid attention for the entire film but I can't really name a single event that took place.  I suppose some would call that a strength, that the film is just a small sampling of life.  I call it boring.

Three siblings live together.  Two of them can pass for white while the other one can't.  I think the problem is that the filmmakers were so intent on pushing boundaries (which to be fair, they did) that they forgot they had to at least sort of try to make a decent film.

The editing is terrible and the script is apparently improvisational.  Strangely enough, the dialogue felt very forced and unnatural.

All that being said, the fact that this film depicted interracial sex is pretty amazing.  I love early films but I have been getting really sick of the production code.

Interesting subject matter, poor execution.

RATING: **---

Interesting Facts:

The love scene was shot in Katharine Hepburn's brother's house.