“The movies are a conspiracy. They set you up to believe in… Everything!” Minnie Moore
This is John Cassavetes’ quirkiest film, and one of his most accessible. Bankrolled by Universal in that brief period when countercultural cinema flourished in the mainstream, the movie consciously tests the terms by which Hollywood romance infects our reality, and vice versa. It’s a screwball comedy of sorts, with the long-haired parking attendant Seymour Cassel pitching woo at the classy – but lonely – curator Gena Rowlands. (Both go to watch Bogart movies, separately and then together.) It’s a bruising kind of courtship, sometimes joyously slapsticky, sometimes searingly painful (a combination that will probably be familiar to everyone).
This was the first time Rowlands enjoyed the lead role in her husband’s films, and we can sense his growing fascination and admiration for her. In Minnie we see the seeds of Mabel Longhetti (A Woman Under the Influence) and Myrtle Gordon (Opening Night). That the story can also be read as a comic gloss on Cassavetes’ and Rowlands’ own love story suggests Minnie and Moskowitz is a more important film in their oeuvre than it has generally been given credit for.
Joyous.
Time magazine
The best American movie of 1971.
Joseph Gelmis, Newsday
A buoyant, backhanded tribute to Hollywood in general and romance in particular.
Diane Jacobs, Hollywood Renaissance
John Cassavetes
Gena Rowlands, Seymour Cassel, John Cassavetes, Val Avery
USA
1971
English
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Credits
Screenwriter
John Cassavetes
Cinematography
Alric Edens, Michael Margulies, Arthur J. Ornitz
Editor
Frederic L. Knudtson
Also in This Series
Dedicated to one of the most inspiring and influential American actresses of the past half century, this series showcases the versatility and star power that was Gena Rowlands.
Faces
Ten years after his landmark debut, Shadows, John Cassavetes returned to the indie model, self-financing this wrenching portrait of the sexual mores and miseries of American middle class. Gena Rowlands is luminous as Jeannie, the film's emotional barometer.
A Woman Under the Influence
Gena Rowlands is extraordinary in this painful and compassionate trial of love, the most intense and essential movie from legendary independent filmmaker John Cassavetes. "The toughest of all great American films." Kent Jones
Minnie and Moskowitz
John Cassavetes' deliciously witty take on Hollywood romance is a modern screwball comedy, a mismatched love story between a car park attendant (Seymour Cassel) and a museum administator (Gena Rowlands) who believes herelf to be too good for him.
Gloria
Gena Rowlands was nominated for Best Actress for her portrait of gangster's moll Gloria Swenson: a tough, chain-smoking broad who finds herself running from her former friends in the mob to protect her next door neighbour's orphaned six-year-old kid.
Love Streams
The last movie Gena Rowlands and John Cassavetes made together is an eccentrically beautiful, painful piece about a writer (Cassavetes) broken out of his self-imposed exile by the arrival of a son he doesn't know, and a sister he hasn't seen in years.
