A Woman Under the Influence (1974, dir. John Cassavetes) ****/****

     "A Woman Under the Influence" is a tour-de-force from director John Cassavetes.  It is an uncompromising, harrowing look into madness and what society perceives as "madness".  Gena Rowlands' Mabel is a completely original character and it is truly a brilliant piece of acting from the female lead.  The whole cast is great.  Peter Falk's Nick is a wonderful portrait of a man struggling to deal with his wife's erratic behaviour and his own attempts to communicate his love for her.
   Typically of Cassavetes, there are scene which seemingly contain no purpose to the plot, but they give us a fascinating glimpse into the lives and mindsets of the various character and their eccentricities.  In an early scene, Nick brings a group of his co-workers home to share a meal after being forced to work a double shift.  Mabel prepares them a spaghetti dinner and there is much banter and idiosyncratic conversations over the course of the meal.  It is scenes like this that allow us to live with the characters on screen, get to know them better, and expose us to emotional truths.  A mainstream director wouldn't have included such a scene or spent so much time on it, but it is the mark of the director's genius that we are given the privilege of seeing such meaningful scenarios even if they don't advance the narrative all that much.
    Madness is not a topic that is dealt with frequently in cinema and when it is it is often done falsely and with gross stereotypes.  This film forces the viewer to question what he or she perceives as madness and the labels we put on people who are not conventional and do not conform to society's norms.  Mabel loves her husband and children but she is prone to high emotions and quirky tics in her manner.  She is thus forced to enter a psychiatric hospital near the middle of the film.  Six months go by and she returns to her family beaten down but seemingly not "cured" of her eccentricity.
   It could be argued that Nick is really the insane one in the family in his aggressive nature and high-strung personality.  "A Woman Under the Influence" portrays the limited social mobility of women in 1970's American culture and makes us question our preconceived notions.  It is a cinematic wake-up call and exposes emotional truths like no other film of its time.  It is also a demonstration of the sheer genius of its actors and director.