Regie:
John CassavetesCamera:
Al RubanMuziek:
Bo HarwoodActeurs:
Gena Rowlands, John Cassavetes, Diahnne Abbott, Seymour Cassel, Leslie Hope, Xan Cassavetes, Gregg Berger, Raphael De Niro, Al Ruban, David Rowlands (meer)Samenvattingen(1)
With Israeli filmmakers Golan and Globus watching over him, director John Cassavetes was guilty of less self-indulgence than usual, and the result is one of his best movies ever. Appearing for the first time in a movie that he also directed, Cassavetes and real-life spouse Gena Rowlands team up as a brother and sister, Robert Harmon and Sarah Lawson. The screen exudes their intensity; and despite their apparently different personalities, a oneness of spirit unites them. Robert is a well-known author, who is researching a book on prostitution and becomes the den father to some lively ladies of the evening. His research takes him on nightly forays to the underbelly of town. Sarah is a delicate creature in the throes of a divorce and custody battle against her husband, Jack (Seymour Cassel). The intercutting of the two stories contrasts the tawdriness of Roberts life to the exemplariness of Sarahs. For half the movie we see their separate lives and wonder when and if they will get together. Rowlands is wonderfully convincing in her many opportunities to play unusual scenes. Cassavetes also has his moments. More an amalgam of telling bits and pieces than a real story, owever, it all seems to work. (officiële tekst van distribiteur)
(meer)Recensie (3)
A 140-minute ode to vanity, slacking, irresponsibility, alcoholism and mental disarray, masquerading as an ode to the complexity of relationships and finding and maintaining love within them. Getting to know the characters in the first half-hour is enjoyable, but they then become boring and finally contend for the title of the most annoying and unbearable characters in the history of generally favorably reviewed films (I don’t understand that!). Cutting Love Streams in half and having all of the characters die tragically before the closing credits would have elevated the film to three stars. In a Finnish black comedy, for example, the story would be endearing and sympathetic to the characters, but in the hands of Cassavetes, it becomes unwatchable. That said, I like his other films. [Karlovy Vary International Film Festival]
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To browse the catalogue of John Cassavetes' directorial output means first of all to arm oneself with a considerable amount of patience, because getting on the wave of this distinctive author's work is quite a big nut to crack. His completely grounded yet completely crazy films are not very approachable, and although the director's last purely auteur venture, Love Streams, was made under the banner of the Cannon Group studio (known mainly for action films starring macho dudes wielding machine-guns), don't expect anything different and more accessible from him. Through Cassavetes, producers Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus simply wanted to validate themselves as creators of worthwhile art. Of the many films by John Cassavetes presented in Karlovy Vary in recent years, this one caught me by far the most, and yet, I am reluctant to recommend it to anyone right away. [KVIFF 2024]
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Truly a very "personal" Cassavetes film and also in its own way somewhat optimistic. I would perhaps use the word sentimental, although not in the usual pejorative sense. Cassavetes already knew back then that he didn't have too many years left, and without being a fan of incorporating the author's personal life into the final work, it shows in the film with his not-always-well-combined split between scenes of pessimistic despair and optimistic refusal to give up on life without love. On one hand, it’s classic Cassavetes - solitude, awkwardness, boredom, and alcohol, which gets to your head (in the film, Cassavetes occasionally reminds us of Gazzara from The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, while Gena Rowlands also reminds us of A Woman Under the Influence). On the other hand, the grotesque scenes are deliberately comedic (Rowlands and her suitcases). In between lies a middle ground of comedy, which is chilling - again, classic Cassavetes - in which the characters desperately try to convince themselves that happiness is possible. The question is: why are these relaxed scenes in the film? Probably precisely because the author somehow did not want to forget the "optimism" and hope in anticipation of the end, I think. That wouldn't be a problem if these scenes (in my opinion) didn't somewhat disrupt the tightness of the entire film and create an impression of authorial and script inconsistency, which can only be explained by pointing to something outside the film itself.
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