A WOMAN UNDER THE INFLUENCE (1974)

Even in the opening shot of John Cassavetes’s startling A Woman Under the Influence, there’s an uncommon sense of anxiety: men searching through a body of water, trawling through the murky depths that run up to their waist. It looks like someone has gone missing in that muddy reservoir, and the impersonal, documentary shooting style lends an air of authenticity to the portrait. It looks like a tragic news story, the horrifying conclusion to a missing person’s case. Nothing has even happened yet, and we already feel ill at ease.

This is how Mabel (Gena Rowlands) often feels: anxious. Married to Nick (Peter Falk), a construction foreman and father to her three children, Mabel frequently feels nervous, then ecstatic, then melancholic, and then full of tenderness and warmth. She oscillates between emotional states so quickly it confuses those around her. When it seems as though her erratic behaviour is becoming increasingly disturbed, her loving husband fears there is nothing he can do to help her.

A Woman Under the Influence remains a mesmerising, harrowing depiction of domestic heartache, physical abuse, and mental illness. This is not a story for the fainthearted. It’s a tragic tale about Nick and Mabel, two people who are desperately in love, but without the tools to overcome the hurdles in front of them. It is all depicted with an unflinching gaze, as Cassavetes never affords his audience the opportunity to look away: we are firmly planted in the Longhetti household, and just like Nick, we feel trapped.

Perhaps what is most commendable about Cassavetes’s film is how he writes and directs a story about mental illness so sensitively. There is great nuance in how he reveals the way contemporary society approaches such a tricky subject. It’s first seen in a conversation between Nick and his co-worker, where he states: “Mabel is not crazy, she’s unusual. She’s not crazy — so don’t say she’s crazy.”

There are a couple of ways that we could interpret this dialogue. The first is that Nick is loyally defending his wife, irritated with someone being flippantly exaggerative in describing the woman he loves. However, it could also be the first of many red flags: Nick doesn’t possess the tools to deal with someone mentally unstable, so he merely denies the potential seriousness of Mabel’s condition. Truthfully, it is more likely a combination of the two.

Most of all, Nick’s insistence that his wife isn’t mentally ill, that she’s merely unusual, reveals a clear dichotomy between his private life and the external world. Each time we see agents infect their home from the outside, it leads to an increase in turmoil, dismay, and anger. Soon, it becomes increasingly clear that Mabel is not well: she seems delirious, on the verge of a mental breakdown. But even more tellingly, no one in her circle actually helps her.

Cassavetes appears to be commenting on the way in which women throughout history have been marginalised, forgotten, and mistreated. Only seven years earlier, Peter Lennon’s ground-breaking documentary Rocky Road to Dublin (1967) revealed how women were still being treated as second-class citizens in Ireland, with clergy members explaining away any potential grievances as being divinely ordained. They were not given control over their bodies, and it’s much the same in Cassavetes’s transfixing portrayal of society’s apathy to troubled women.

After Nick stands up Mabel on their planned date night (a pipe explosion keeps him on site all night), Mabel wanders into the city, gets blind drunk, and is taken home by a man she just met. It’s unclear if Garson Cross (George Dunn), the man who drives her home and takes advantage of her when she’s barely conscious, sexually assaults her after she has gone to bed. But what is starkly apparent is that no one prevented him from taking her home, even though she could barely stand.

It’s for this same reason that Mabel is so easily committed, and forced into treatment of electroconvulsive therapy. It’s true that Mabel does need help— just not the kind she’s being offered. I don’t believe she needed to be separated from her family for six months, isolated and abandoned in a mental hospital. Yet, this is precisely what happens, and not a single person questions the decision.

At the same time, I find it very difficult to demonise Nick. He loves his wife, and he wants to make her happy— he just doesn’t know how. I genuinely believe he’s trying to do the best that he can, despite the fact it’s woefully inadequate. There’s absolutely no excusing his domestic violence (he slaps Mabel on two occasions): she poses no threat to him, and it’s apparent she’s a defenceless person.

Yet, some of the most heartbreaking drama comes from when you can understand villainous behaviour: how would you react if your partner just attempted to commit suicide, if they tried to slash their wrists in front of your three small children? I don’t know how I would handle that situation, and I’m speaking from a position where tolerance and understanding of mental disorders has come leaps and bounds in half a century. The great tragedy is that Nick truly loves Mabel, and never considers leaving her, yet his attempts to ameliorate their situation reveal his ignorance.

In this way, outcomes are never simplistic in A Woman Under the Influence. This story is very much rooted in the real world, where a blue-collar worker and his unstable wife are moving dangerously close to the brink. That’s why it feels as though each fight, each breakdown, and each misunderstanding feels as though it will have dire consequences. It’s for this reason that Nick, Mabel, and the three children force smiles, and talk amiably about how happy they will all be in the future.

It’s impossible to talk about this film without recognising Rowland’s performance as one of the greatest dramatic showings in the history of cinema. She is absolutely sensational here. Moving from gut-wrenchingly sad to surprisingly amusing in one swift change of expression, this is one of the very rare performances that stay with you long after you last watched it. Over the course of 155 minutes, Rowland lays bare the emotions of an otherwise inscrutable woman.

Truly, I don’t think I’ve ever seen any actor convey the ups and downs of mental illness quite as vividly as Rowland does here. Her stunned expression after she’s snapped out of her reverie, her once joyful demeanour transmogrifying into a shameful repose, worried she’s embarrassed her husband in company. Tear-filled eyes seeking confirmation from him that she behaved acceptably. And after she returns from hospital, she tries her hardest not to cry, because she’s terrified she’ll be sent away again. So she clutches her children close to her: “I’m just trying very hard not to get excited.”

The cinematography in A Woman Under the Influence denies the viewer the choice to remain distant: it’s up close and personal, right on Rowland and Falk’s face. Cinematographers Mitch Breit and Al Ruban mostly maintain focus, but even when they don’t, it somehow adds to the realism of these scenes. It feels as though this domestic dispute is genuinely happening, not just in our living room, but less than a foot away from your nose. Such proximity to suffering renders the film an incredibly discomfiting viewing. Much like how Nick and Mabel feel, it is always right in the middle of the situation.

Falk once said of Cassavetes: “Every Cassavetes film is always about the same thing. Somebody said, ‘Man is God in ruins,’ and John saw the ruins with a clarity that you and I could not tolerate.” It feels like a perfect description of A Woman Under the Influence; it’s such a tragic story, I’m not sure at times that I even like the film. It pains me to watch a mother’s horrified expression as she’s told she’s an inept parent, and I hate watching a well-intentioned man, who only wants to help, do the exact opposite. They’re dysfunctional, they’re in love, and they feel unshakeably authentic.

Towards the end of our story, Nick cleans Mabel’s bleeding hand. As he dabs away the blood with a wet cloth, she asks him: “Do you love me?” Nick looks at her in the eyes. He pauses. He starts to say something. And then, finally, he says nothing at all. Why is it he can’t say those words? Does he not love his wife? I don’t think that’s the answer. I believe he does love her, that he loves her more than his children, more than anyone else in his life. But I think this realisation frightens him: it’s the recognition that he’s just as helpless as she is, and that their dynamic may never really improve.

Yes, they will try again tomorrow. And perhaps a new day will reveal that all things are possible. But I’m not sure. We can’t ever be certain that things will get better for them. We only have that present moment, and we look on with a vague sense of disgust that we’re witness to something so intimate, a scene so personal and raw. Because while they talk about how happy they’ll be, we only see things spiralling out of control: a father striking his wife to the ground, children trying to wrestle a blade from their parents, and a mother tucking her sons and daughter into bed, with teary eyes and bloody hands.

USA | 1974 | 146 MINUTES | COLOUR | ENGLISH • ITALIAN

Cast & Crew

writer & director: John Cassavates.
starring: Gena Rowlands, Peter Falk, Fred Draper, Lady Rowlands, Katherine Cassavetes, Matthew Laborteaux, George Dunn, Mario Gallo, Matthew Cassel & Christina Grisanti.