FACES by John Cassavetes
September 29th, 2004 by Andre Soares
Faces (1968) NO STARS
Direction and screenplay: John Cassavetes. Cast: John Marley, Gena Rowlands, Lynn Carlin, Fred Draper, Seymour Cassel, Val Avery
HEADS
John Cassavetes reportedly threw the money he made in the 1968 horror hit Rosemary’s Baby into his finishing touches on Faces, a personal project he had begun filming in 1966. Cassavetes spent months (some sources say a couple of years) editing the film into a "manageable" six hours, and eventually into its final 130 minutes. Silent-film maverick Erich von Stroheim would have been proud of him — at least in regard to the film’s (initial) length and to Cassavetes’ committed auteurship. Now, would the irascible Stroheim have approved of the frequently inaudible dialogue, sloppy editing, poor lighting, careless camera placement, pseudo-naturalistic acting, and utterly ludicrous interchanges between characters? Probably not.
Shot in 16mm (that looks more like poorly developed Super 8) black and white, Faces is John Cassavetes’ home movie from hell. When its characters got drunk, this reviewer got restless. When its characters got philosophical, this reviewer got sleepy. When its characters screamed out of despair, this reviewer screamed, too — out of sheer boredom.
Cassavetes was apparently too enamored of his own innovative brilliance to let a mere story get in the way of cute cinematic tricks. These include the use of a handheld camera that helps make the barely discernible action even murkier, and an overabundance of closeups. True, the film is called Faces, but unlike Ingmar Bergman, whose camera closeups transport us into the soul of his actors, Cassavetes only presents us with talking heads. And do those heads talk.
What they actually talk about is anyone’s guess, since much of the dialogue is inaudible, but the sections that are intelligible are best described by one line in the movie: "Blah, blah, blah." And when actors are given loads of blah-blah-blahs, their performances come across as one single, flat blah.
That is unfortunate, for underneath all the artificially created rawness there is a real, tragic story about a desperately lonely married couple struggling to come to terms with their crumbling relationship. (When Faces came out, Cassavetes and leading lady Gena Rowlands, like the lead characters in the film, had been married for fourteen years. John Marley, in fact, looks like an older Cassavetes.)
Faces is a historically important motion picture because it is, at least officially, the first independently made and distributed American film to reach mainstream audiences. Be that as it may, Faces remains a pretentious, unintelligent, turgid motion picture.
For a no-holds-barred marriage-on-the-rocks motion picture, check out Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Synopsis:
A group of film executives get together to watch their newest movie: Faces.
The film within a film begins with two drunk, middle-aged businessmen babbling the night away in the company of a high-class prostitute. One of the men, Freddie (Fred Draper), is an insufferable bore who has strong misogynistic tendencies; the other, Richard Forst (John Marley), a married man, develops feelings for the prostitute, Jeannie (Gena Rowlands). Richard’s fourteen-year marriage has been suffering from chronic ennui for some time, and the cool, experienced Jeannie arises his long dormant spirit. It doesn’t take long before Richard returns to Jeannie’s home for more fun and games — plus some nasty arguments with a few of her drunk, woman-hating clients.
Meanwhile, Richard’s much younger though equally bored wife, Maria (Lynn Carlin), decides that she also needs some excitement of her own. Joined by a group of female friends, she goes to a club where she meets a nice young man, Chet (Seymour Cassel). Later in the evening at Maria’s home, the women try to figure out who’s going to bed the eager-to-please Chet. Maria is the lucky one. She and Chet have a night of sex and physical solace, which is followed by a morning of guilt and a suicide attempt. Maria is saved by Chet, who slaps her some and then hands her a cigarette. He also tells her that "nobody has the time to be vulnerable to each other."
When Richard returns, Chet flees by jumping out the window. Now, husband and wife are once again left to their empty — if drastically changed — selves.
DVD:
In September 2004, the Criterion Collection released John Cassavetes: Five Films, a box set that includes the Faces Region 1 DVD (U.S. / Canada / U.S. territories).
Features:
- Eight-Disc Box Set includes the following films:
- Shadows (1959), 81 minutes, 1.33:1 aspect ratio
- Faces (1968), 130 minutes, 1.66:1 aspect ratio
- A Woman Under the Influence (1974), 147 minutes, 1.85:1 aspect ratio
- The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976), 135 & 108 minute versions, 1.85:1 aspect ratio
- Opening Night (1977), 144 minutes, 144 minutes, 1.66:1 aspect ratio
- A Constant Forge (2000), 200 minutes, 1.33:1 aspect ratio
List price: US$124.95.
A Criterion Collection release.
Notes:
Gena Rowlands was John Cassavetes’s wife from 1954 to his death in February 1989.
Before appearing in Faces, Lynn Carlin was director Robert Altman’s personal secretary.
The "innovative" trick of having the main storyline be a film within a film can be seen at least as early as 1940, in Marcel L’Herbier’s La Comédie du bonheur.
Life film critic Richard Schickel reportedly threw a hissy fit when Faces lost by one vote the New York Film Critics Circle Best Picture Award to The Lion in Winter. According to Variety’s Stuart Byron, Schickel verbally attacked several veteran film critics, labeling them "deadwood." At the end of the showdown, "some of those girls had tears in their eyes." Schickel and three fellow critics resigned in protest from the New York Critics Circle, though according to Mason Wiley and Damien Bona’s Inside Oscar, the resignation lasted only until the next award season.
THE LIFE AQUATIC WITH STEVE ZISSOU
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