Review of Opening Night (1977) by Scott T — 10 Mar 2009

Of the five films in the Criterion box set, this is the only one that leaves me feeling ambivalent. On the one hand, I appreciate how far afield Cassavetes moved from the aggressive framing, montage, and acting that dominate "Shadows," "Faces," and to a large extent, "A Woman Under the Influence.

" In its place, Cassavetes extends his use of the long take as it was deployed in "Killing of a Chinese Bookie," often staging extremely long shots with a totally static camera (out of deference to the theater?).

On the other hand, though, a great deal of the crazy vitality that marks the aforementioned films is absent here. Rowlands gives what is arguably her best performance for Cassavetes, but the surrounding cast is unremarkable.

Indeed, Cassavetes himself delivers some surprisingly wooden and obvious dialogue, pointing to a curious and larger problem in the film: the apparent absence of subtext. Come to think of it, Cassavetes has long traded in the energy available on the surface of a film.

His most famous films wear the viewer out with a kind of intensity rarely seen on screen, but also suffer from the emptiness lingering after a sugar rush. Perhaps the most surprising quality of this film is how little it advances the genre of the backstage melodrama.

Nonetheless, watching the transformation of Cassavetes' style is fascinating in its own right.