This is the film Cassavetes did for Hollywood bossmen after the debacle of Opening Night. While it is far from his norm - it has music cues and a score, a gangster plot with a few shootouts - aren't we better off that he had the opportunity to go out with a camera that year and not sit around in dismay? Cherish it, he had only one more left.It is his most straightforward and probably written in a haste, crude in spots, about an ex-mafia moll and a little kid running from gangsters around New York. It wouldn't be out of place in a double bill with Don Siegel really, or not that much.It actually casts light on another side of Cassavetes, less talked about. One was of course the visionary swimmer into streams of soul, tossing and turning in search of a true face.. Another was the actor who took odd paying jobs, wearing a variety of faces to finance that vision when he got back, very much like Welles whom he admired. He had done all sorts, many that were crime stuff on and off TV. Adored Cagney.We have deliberate reference of all those gangster films of old here, gumshoes and broads stuff, Rowlands as female Bogart (she calls other women dames), in turns snarling at bad guys and coolly walking away, waving it all off as dream. But this isn't that cocksure type film; this is about dreams, hopes, frayed nerves.The little boy salvaged from a gangster plot is the center that keeps pulling her back, summoning more of her gangster past around her, including finally the lover she never made it with. You can see how in longer Cassavetes form we would have uncertain life as this woman floats around bars and odd rooms and contrasts with being pulled back to a role she left behind, pulled to get out of it. Chinese Bookie comes to mind. That would have been tremendous to see but we have something else. All of the cool stuff are anachronistic at this point, not really draped with a sense of cool, which is a fashion sense. Cassavetes wouldn't know cool from a bar of soap really, lovable dunce that he was, so it comes out on the other side of the familiar posturing in an unselfconscious way.It's all abit like Rowlands' clothing (foisted on her by Cassavetes). That red kimono would have been fabulous in Rita Hayworth times but looks a bit out of place now, odd. Ditto Rowlands' tough expressions, as if propped up with some effort. This is all far from where the likes of Tarantino and Besson, who grew up in movies, would take these things to iron them out. You can watch this and see how that would play out.There's a weariness without sentimentality here that seeps in through an open window somewhere in this room that you've found yourself in for the night. A sense of not having much more time for masks and that whole posturing where you have to be someone. This is tied in that sweet exchange about "beating the system" between her and boy. People usually don't, but maybe some do, who knows? Who really cares about a system?Underneath it all there's a marvelous sense of wandering that I find myself giving into always in movies; it seems we go everywhere in New York. Underneath the worn fabrics, this is one about the (existential) body that must wear them, about weight that doesn't manage to hold you down. The sublime point as ever with Cassavetes is not giving up.

Gloria Swenson's a gun moll all growed up. The mob ain't got time for her no more, and instead of getting' her kicks like she did in the good 'ole days, she lives alone with her cat in a crappy joint in the slums of New York. It ain't much, but it's something, and she's gotta live, ya know? Now get lost.Gloria may have a sordid past in her wake, but she is certainly not a floozy with a few wrinkles too many. She is a tough-as-nails presence that has been around the block plenty of times, unafraid of anything except maybe the cold eyes of death. Gloria is also portrayed by Gena Rowlands, and Gloria is directed by John Cassavetes, her husband.Gena Rowlands and John Cassavetes are national treasures, but when your finest pieces of work are confined to ambitiously outlandish independent films, you're bound to only be remembered by the critics who don't have much fun watching Vin Diesel's newest vehicle. They teamed up seven times, but Gloria is the closest thing they ever got to the word "conventional." Despite a slightly over-the-top soundtrack, possibly a quirk added by the mercurial Cassavetes, gone are his usual touches of slapped around camera-work and obvious improvisations. With Gloria, he's an auteur taking a vacation, and it makes for one of his most entertaining, if not one of his deepest, projects.The movie begins in ruins; Jack Dawn (Buck Henry) has made the mistake of double-crossing the mob. Not only has he been skimming money from the profits of their various crimes, but he has also been acting as an informant for the FBI. He, along with his family, are barricaded in a crammed apartment, attempting to hold off hired guns for as long as possible. Then Gloria, a neighbor, comes knocking on their door. She wants to borrow sugar, but instead gets Jack's son, Phil (John Adames). Then the inevitable happens: Phil is orphaned, and Gloria, reluctantly, is forced to take him in. Problem is, the mob knows about it. After this set-up pulls through, the rest of the film acts as a punchy and darkly funny game of cat-and-mouse between Gloria, her newfound Puerto Rican child friend, and, well, the mob.Gloria's only downfall is that it becomes a little monotonous after a while — you can only handle Phil running away and Gloria having to chase after him for so long — but it's much too lovable to really get on your nerves. For once, Cassavetes backs off and lets Rowlands be the star of the show; in the past, it was as if Cassavetes and Rowlands were headlining together (not a bad thing), looking like the cool boho versions of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. But even Ginger Rogers had to have Kitty Foyle all to herself.Everything about Rowlands — her light but steely Wisconsin accent, her big hair, her hastily put-on red lipstick, her cheap high heels — is dynamite. In her other films with Cassavetes (1974's A Woman Under the Influence, 1977's Opening Night), she has had to pour out every emotion she's ever felt, as if she were stripping naked in front of a crowd. But in Gloria, it's clear that she's having fun. Rowlands carries a gun with imposing authority, like a street tough that surprises you with their scrappiness. Even better is her chemistry with the loud and unintentionally funny Adames, who spits out every line with bracing liberation. Gloria is engaging but intimidating, but Phil doesn't much care, and when she can't turn her usual tricks to get him to behave, the playfulness of the film climbs every mountain and fords every stream.Gloria runs a little long at two hours, but it isn't without its charms. Rowlands is a wonderful, wonderful actress, and there isn't a second of the film where we don't ask ourselves what we did to deserve a talent this great in the movie business. I adore Cassavetes with just as much fuss, but this time around, it isn't his show. It's hers, and that's not a bad thing.

"Gloria" is probably the only Cassavetes' film that relies on a formulaic plot: the improbable pairing that turns into a friendship and I suspect it's the most likely to disorient the hardcore fans of Cassavetes' unique directorial style, in other words, to be the least appreciated of his films. Still, it's the one that earned Gena Rowlands, the most defining face of the director's filmography, her second nomination for an Oscar.It's hard to believe that Gena Rowlands only had two nominations in her career, and that she didn't even win for "A Woman Under the Influence" which belongs to the list of the greatest female performances ever. Never mind. Here, Gena portrays Gloria, the neighbor of a doomed Puerto-Rican family. She enters as casually as ever to ask for some coffee and finds herself in the middle of a panic-stricken family scene. And what seems to be more inexplicable that the casting of Buck Henry as the geeky waspish connected-to-the-mob father (I loved Roger Ebert's comment on that one) is the way he jeopardized his family's life by threatening to give some names to the FBI, names that were all conveniently collected in a little book. After a quick second thought, the casting of Buck Henry is top notch, he looks like the kind of men to commit such incredible mistakes, and as we see him argue with his wife, remarkably played by the beautiful Julie Carmen, the feeling of urgency is efficiently conveyed. Indeed, we know it's only a matter of minutes before the gangsters start shooting and Gloria's entrance is like providence knocking on the door.Gloria is a blonde woman in her late forties or early fifties (Gena Rowlands was 50), she's single but she probably seen a lot in her bed, she doesn't like kids and especially Carmen's kids, a touch of irony that makes her the perfect candidate to take care of little Phil, the eight-year old son who'd keep his father's book. Gloria has the perfect mix of sophistication and street-wise attitude, and I guess one of the reasons that earned her an Oscar nomination is that she literally created something new on screen. Gloria has some mimics that remind of Gena's earliest roles, and her accent is just a delight for ears, but then when she suddenly pulled a gun off her purse, it's a total metamorphosis, and a landmark in Cassavetes's canon. For the first time, an actor transfigures a character to make the role appealing on a true cinematic level, regardless of any realistic approach. Gloria becomes a true heroine in all the meanings of the word without the sexiness of usual exploitations' female protagonists."You're so tough" will repeat little Phil, with eyes that are either impressed or full of love. Is it realistic that a child would fall in love with a woman like Gloria? I don't think any child would but then not any child would have been casted for that role. Here, Cassavetes did one incredible choice, because either John Adames' performance is one of the best or the worst when it comes to child acting. I still haven't made up my mind yet but I do believe it was absolutely distasteful for the Razzies to give the award of Worst Supporting Actor to a child. Now, was he good or bad? I felt the way he was dressed very weird, sometimes the way he delivered his lines was whiny and irritating, and when he was playing adult and tough, I was like "gee, what's wrong with this kid?" but then you understand that as much as the film would have been different without Gena Rowlands, it would have been maybe worse with a 'normal' kid. I mean 'normal' by cinematic standards. Could have you dealt with the same story told by Spielberg?Kids have a strange ability to outsmart adults in movies or to act in the most insolent, eccentric and annoying way as if they were comforted by the tacit rule that 'kids don't die in films'. Think of all the ones you saw in Disaster films, little boys who were braver than their whiny sisters (another stereotype), who displayed an insolent courage in front of the villains when any normal child would have wept or cried for his mommy. In the name of dramatization, the portrayal of little boys and little girls has suffered from a severe distance from reality. Cassavetes never cared for clichés and you could see in his earlier films how children kind of behaved naturally, where adults were the most childish persons actually. In "Gloria", he creates here a kid so cinematically abnormal that we can believe a boy would act that way, the way he delivers his lines, the content of these lines can be debated but I'd rather take his attitude than one that would obey to a standard. At the end, he fitted the role, didn't ruin the film and the best measure of that aspect is his chemistry with Gloria.While the friendship is the emotional core, the film strikes by its abundances of cat-and- mouse scenes, the gangster looking for Gloria, Gloria herself looking for Phil. Thanks to the directing and the score from Bill Conti, sometimes a bit overdone, the dosage between thrills and sentiments is perfectly handled and allow us to grow some feelings toward these two characters. In a way, the film carries so much comedy beyond the drama that we couldn't have dealt with a sad ending. And Cassavetes, aware that he's not probably making the highlight of his career, let the events flow naturally until a climactic confrontation and a finale that concludes the film in a very satisfying way. "Gloria" could have been better, but it also could have been worse. Just ask yourself what if another director made "Gloria"

Gena Rowlands is Gloria, a tough gangster's moll who gets in over her head when she agrees (reluctantly) to take care of 6 year old Phil Dawn(John Adames), the half Puerto Rican neighbor whose parents (Buck Henry and Julie Carmen) realize that they are about to be murdered by the mob. Henry, a mob bookkeeper, has turned over states evidence, and this means a death sentence for him and his family (which includes a daughter and mother-in-law). Gloria makes it clear from the beginning that she doesn't like kids, much less this one, but unconsciously takes him anyway, leading to a show-off between her and old mob associates, which includes her former lover. Gloria isn't afraid of using her gun to keep the mobsters away from the boy, and instantly, this brings sympathy towards her seemingly cold character. Like gangster's molls of the great crime dramas, she is hiding a heart of gold underneath all that toughness, and that makes the film extremely engrossing in watching out how it all unfolds.Rowlands and Adames are powerful in their performances, and they share an amazing chemistry together. Adames doesn't act like any movie kid; he is real. Why he won a "Razzie" (Worst) Supporting Actor award makes no sense to me. Rowlands plays the role as if she were Gloria Grahame, Ida Lupino and Ann Savage all rolled up into one. This lady will take no nonsense, even telling a tough waitress at a Grand Central restaurant to take a hike. In fact, the film makes great use of New York locales not usually seen in mainstream films. The film is filled with many clichés, and the ending is very forumalatic (in a "The Lady Vanishes" way), but it left me feeling totally satisfied. Sometimes formula works, especially when the heart is present, and this film is filled with heart.