Actuakers One of my all time favorites.

Steineded How sad is this?

MamaGravity good back-story, and good acting

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Blake Peterson The American Dream, from the '60s standpoint, was supposed to be a fantasy lived by Lucy and Ethel and the Bradys. But "Life", "Vanity Fair", and "Photoplay" tended to stretch the truth for the sake of eye catching imagery, all red lipstick, picnic baskets, Ford convertibles, and not much else. And while Debbie Reynolds and Dick Van Dyke told us how we should be looking, acting, feeling, the rest of the world shifted in its mindset, going from years of repression to a sudden soul searching state of disillusion, increasingly thrown off course by the sexual revolution, Vietnam, and Watergate. I'm sure some of the period's population was decently happy, but a time of changed attitudes and values can only lead sights and sounds into places unexplored before, unsatisfying at their revelatory peaks."Faces", a defining film in the astonishing breadth of the daring '60s, grabs The American Dream by its lapels and throws its ideals down a life-sized paper shredder, screaming in our faces that Doris Day and her well-off friends lied — adorable romantic misunderstandings and colorful lifestyles is not the America America knows. It's just a drippingly chintzy version of one. So with its grainy, 16 mm black-and-white, emotive actors, and innate directorial style (courtesy of auteur John Cassavetes), "Faces" is one of the few films that convincingly captures the hardships that lacerate everyday life, placing each and every one of its characters at the center of a crisis and watching, unsparingly, how they handle it.Following the disintegration of a fourteen year marriage over the course of a series of drunken nights, "Faces" examines Richard (John Marley) and Maria Forst (Lynn Carlin) as they attempt to navigate their loose vulnerabilities after Richard suddenly announces he wants a divorce. The proclamation makes perfect sense to Richard — he's been cheating on his wife for years (the film opens with a boozy get-together that sees him and his friend entertaining a couple of prostitutes) — but the exclamation nearly tears Maria in half. Though she's been unhappy for far too long, there's an underlying feeling that she really does love her husband, and while the union has run its course, she doesn't want to be alone in this cold, cruel world.They spend the next few nights figuring out what's going to become of them, growing increasingly depressed and increasingly retrospective, pensive. Richard busies himself attempting to shack up with a hooker without a heart of gold (Gena Rowlands), Maria fogging out her loneliness with her female friends, gradually meeting a hippie (Seymour Cassel) well-meaning but damaging in his unrelenting positivity. By the end of the film, the Forsts don't find themselves freed by their lack of marital responsibility — hanging over their heads is a question mark drenched in sleeping pills and liquor, wondering aloud if all there is to look forward to in life is misery."Faces" isn't the kind of film made for the pure sake of enjoyment — most, including me, would much prefer to sit through a two-hour Bond adventure than a depressing, jarringly styled character piece — but its blunt truthfulness and knee-jerking performances make it a tour-de-force rewarding in its mesmerizing account of a world more authentic in its bare bones anguish than most. Never has Cassavetes settled for anything less than honest, so it's only fitting that the majority of his films throw his characters into a pit of chaos and sees where they land. In his most famous moment, "A Woman Under the Influence", he details the dissolve of a housewife's psyche, taking her marriage down with her; in "Love Streams", he throws curveball after curveball at characters so lost in a maze of depression that it's only reasonable to predict that they'll never make their way out."Faces" is the movie that first bolded and underlined his filmmaking style, pulling out massive emotional punches and drawing out visceral performances from his stock of actors. His movie-making instincts are difficult to love at first glance — but after getting to know the situation and the people, the shaky camera, documentary-like, heightens the gutsiness of it all, adding to the dire circumstances that befall nearly every scene. As we analyze the ensemble of "Faces", split in half most of the time, a sense of impending doom slithers along the cracks of the ceiling. None of these characters are stable, so much so that we can only ponder if they will die naturally or if they will inflict wounds upon themselves to make their demise come quicker. The women of the film, Rowlands and Carlin, cover their sorrows with fake laughs and unconvincing smiles; Rowlands makes the case that her character has always been that way — she plays a prostitute, therefore used to irrepressible gloom — but Carlin goes on a downward spiral resembling Monica Vitti's mental deterioration in "Red Desert", absorbing but absolutely gut wrenching. The men, Marley and Cassel, seem more in control: but it quickly becomes apparent that their masculinity can only cover so much ground before their weaknesses begin to present themselves loudly.At 147 minutes, "Faces" is demanding to sit through, sometimes tedious. But, like in all of Cassavetes' movies, there is so much depth to the lack of glamour that we're left torn up, perhaps longer than we'd like to admit. Because the Technicolor world isn't real — the 16 mm one is, and it's hard to accept.

tnrcooper An older man (John Marley as Richard Forst) leaves his wife (Lynn Carlin as Maria Forst) and this film tracks the fallout as he takes up with a younger escort (Gena Rowlands as Jeannie Rapp) and she takes up with a more fun-loving younger man from Detroit (Seymour Cassel as Chet). The caustic moments in this film could peel the paint off walls. The false and forced bonhomie, the hollow laughter and the empty words will rip you to pieces.The cinematography overseen by Al Ruban astonishing. The quick cuts from speakers to their interpolators keep one just a little on edge but don't detract from the tension of the movie.The writing and acting are bracing - the early scene in which Richard shows affection and laughs almost manically as he and his wife share a nice domestic scene. Just a short time later though, we see the change in mood as they lay in bed and Richard, turning away from his wife, looks cold and distant, clearly about something not as pleasant. The rapidly shifting vibe between Richard and Jeannie as he flatters her and then seems cold and cruel toward her and she tries unsuccessfully to retain some emotional distance from him. Gena Rowlands is amazing in her scenes with John Marley. She conveys hurt, playfulness, need, and love in short order.Perhaps my favorite scene is when Richard goes to Jeannie only to find her entertaining two businessmen - Jim and Joe. Both men try to remain cool, not appearing too angry while also attempting to stake their claim for Jeannie's affections. Two powerful men trying to look cool while posturing makes for great entertainment. Cassavetes script conveys the difficulty of their task.The alienation and emotional isolation of Maria's nightcap with her friends and Chet (Seymour Cassel) is also bracing. They try to cheer her up but it seems no one is really having a good time. The mood shifts wildly and no one ends up happy. Astonishing writing and acting from Dorothy Gulliver as Florence and Darlene Conley as Billie Mae, as well as an amazing depiction of heartbreak from Lynn Carlin.The final scene is also amazing for the reserved way it holds in reserve vast amounts of emotional energy. The acting, writing, directing and camera-work here speak to professionals really working at a high level. The rawness of the acting, the skittish camera-work from Ruban, and Cassavetes control over, and vision of, it all, make this a film of the highest caliber.

princebansal1982 All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players. - Shakespeare.To really understand the above statement you have to actually see the instances when the players refuse to play their parts, even if momentarily. Renoir did it in "La Règle du jeu". People playing different roles - master and servant, husband and lover, poacher and grounds-keeper, break for their roles and connect with each other. It is one of the most beautiful movies ever made and has been in AFI Top 10 since it was released.Faces is the anti-thesis of "La Règle du jeu". Here to the player stop playing their parts but instead of connecting with each other, they distance themselves from each other. So we have husband and wife, married woman and a gigolo, married man and a prostitute, all breaking their roles but to distance themselves even more from each other. In process they reveal how the very roles are a sham, that we just play out of habit, convenience and society. It challenges our very lives.Of course, this makes for a very nasty picture but with incredible moments of truth. It is very honest and very depressing and a very hard watch while still being fascinating. Its the kind of picture that you appreciate more than you enjoy.

tomgillespie2002 John Cassavetes' drama shows the breaking point of a long-disintegrating marriage between Richard and Maria Forst (John Marley and Lynn Carlin). At the start of the film, Richard joins his lifelong friend in the home of prostitute Jeannie (Gena Rowlands), where the two sing and dance, and drunkenly make fools of themselves as they try to impress her. He goes home to his wife and the two joke, only for Richard to suddenly announce his desire for a divorce. He goes back to Jeannie, who is now entertaining two businessmen. Maria goes out with her friends and they pick up optimistic dancer Chet (Seymour Cassel). He charms her friends and the two end up alone, where their desire for intimacy brings them together.Cassavetes, known as the pioneer of American independent film-making, is at his most cold here. We are forced to watch these often repulsive characters laugh and interact without ever really connecting. Most of the men in the film are unhappily married and try to fill the void by committing adultery. All they seem to be doing is distancing themselves more from their wives, and increasing the loathing they truly have for themselves. It's a stroke of genius how over the course of two hours, we get to fully understand the mechanics of Robert's and Maria's marriage, even though they only spend about 15 minutes of screen time together. We get to experience it through a facial expression, or a certain glance, or a line of dialogue.Filmed in the style of cinema verite, a device used most successfully by documentary film-makers The Maysles Brothers, Cassavates deploys it to truly get underneath the skin of the characters. We get to see the characters mainly in close-up, and although we are forced to swallow their meandering and dull conversations, the film never feels intimate. And this is the point. These people seem to exist for themselves, and although they communicate, they only really talk to themselves. The title Faces seems like a clever joke. All these people are, are faces. The director's true intentions come out in one of the final scenes, as Chet talks about how mechanical society is, and how everyone longs for, but is terrified, of intimacy. A truly great American drama featuring expert performances, namely from the Oscar-nominated Lynn Carlin and Seymour Cassel.www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com