Watched.
My rating: 9.4/10.
Oh this was heavy! This was heavy. So raw. So heartbreaking. Oh this was heavy...
Gena Rowlands plays a mentally challenged woman with 3 kids. Half an hour into the film and I was thinking to myself if she was like that in real life. Holy smokes rising from the bloody hell can this woman act! She is a beast in this; she makes Joaquin's Phoenix's Joker look like a one note character. She is at times tender and at times manic; at times mean yet at all times innocent. She gives a perfect performance here and I believe to ask more from a thespian would be sheer ignorance. This is one of my favorite performances I've seen so far this year.
Peter Falk is also incredible in this, playing the frustrated husband. You can empathize with him but its difficult to be on his side at times. Very convincing.
The direction and the writing make it feel at times as if you were watching a documentary. Akin to Richard Linklater films, the characters quarrel like real people. In most movies, tension between characters is constantly building, just waiting for it's apex, the climax, and then flooding the audience with the sensory overload of reaction shots.
But in real life, a fight is not like that because you're constantly trying to calm things down. People don't like to make things worse. And because of that in real life, a quarrel will have these phases of rage and calm. Alternating emotions, like a balancing act in a fight. Eventually, one will tip over to one side and considering which side it is, it'll either be calm or a continued state of rage. Before Midnight (2013) did it, Tape (2000) did it, and A Woman Under the Influence did it in spades.
A Woman Under the Influence is a raw, honest and unflinching look at the bleakness of life and the little moments of happiness within.
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