Alec B
Most directors would play this material for cheap laughs and sentiment but not Cassavetes. Not surprisingly, he and Rowlands give magnificent performances.
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
02/28/24
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Dan B
FYI: https://variety.com/2016/film/news/gena-rowlands-john-cassavetes-the-notebook-1201813461/ ;-), DLB
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
01/31/24
Full Review
Audience Member
In 2015, the BBC named Love Streams the 63rd greatest American movie ever made.
What is it doing on our site?
What is it doing coming from Cannon?
Well, according to Austin Trunick's The Cannon Film Guide Volume 1: 1980-1984, there was some mutual admiration between Cassavetes and Cannon. Menahem Golan may have made his money with and breakdancing, but he aspired to greater cinematic heights. Meanwhile, Cassavetes was an artist who didn't want anyone to interfere with his vision, which often had nothing to do with box office.
Somehow, the two came together and agreed to make this movie.
Cannon would get the art cred they wanted.
Cassavetes would get to make a movie his way with a $2 million dollar budget, more than he'd enjoyed for several movies.
Unlike so many of Cannon's two weeks and done movies, Cassavetes got 13 weeks to film Love Streams and it's mostly in one location, the home he shared with wife Gena Rowlands. He also stars in it as writer Robert Harmon, who constantly adds new women to his harem and is often writing them checks.
Gena is is his sister Sarah who can also never find permanent love. If anything, she loves so much that she's pushed away her husband (Seymour Cassel) and begins to collect animals who will at least love her unconditionally.
Robert also has a son Albie, who he teaches to drink and allows to hang out with the showgirls that he lives with. That can't and won't last, as the boy goes back to his mother and our protagonist gets beaten by the boy's stepfather.
Even the brother and sister relationship can't last long, as Sarah's hallucinations begin to take over her mind and she runs into a rainstorm, leaving Robert to laugh like a maniac on the couch before realizing that a naked man is sitting next to him, a man who turns out to be his dog. And that's the ending!
Cassavetes was told that he was going to die from cancer before he made this. He lived for five more years, but he also made the movie like a man knowing he was going to die and not caring what anyone else wanted. Continuity be damned, Cannon's short running time be damned, this was his movie.
It never played theaters in the U.S. and the MGM VHS release cut about twenty minutes. Luckily, we live in a world where the Criterion Collection can release things uncut and we can see what the director truly wanted to show the world.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/06/23
Full Review
Audience Member
The only reason I gave this 1/2 star is because I couldnt give it zero.
This was one of the absolute worst films I have ever seen in my 54 years on this planet, and Ive work in film for 20 years. The accolades this thing has gotten are utterly bewildering to me.
Generally, even the worst films can get a chuckle or perhaps an approving sort of noise from me at at least one point. Not so "Love Streams."
Everything from the script to the acting to the setting to the scenes to the music was atrocious. There was absolutely nothing whatsoever redeeming about this film. I've never been able to say that about a film that's gotten more than two stars before, but here we are.
Utter garbage. Avoid with all your might.
Rated 0.5/5 Stars •
Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars
02/24/23
Full Review
Audience Member
My first Cassavetes, and I feel that I'm already familiar with his style!
From the expressionistic framing, and fancy camera angles to memorable use of music, and multilayered audiovisual imagery, it's not hard at all to tell that John Cassavetes has a major influence on Paul Thomas Anderson's cinematic style and filming techniques.
Almost every single frame keeps pushing the story forward, and adds something new while somehow develops the characters in it.
The camera movements and the transitions, whether between a scene to another or in the scene itself, can reveal something that change your perspective on how you introduced to the sequence for the first time. But all these things happen both brilliantly quickly so they have a great subliminal impact on the viewer, and also that make them far from being flashy and ostentatious as they usually seem.
That said, there are also many things concern Cassavetes's directing style that seemed fresh to me. The thing that I was impressed with the most is how he keeps the tone so dark and serious despite how strange and bizarre the characters are, and how lunatic and bonkers their actions seem. Unlike, PTA who is often lets the whimsical behavior of the his characters give a quirky touch to the movie, there is nothing funny or comical about Cassavetes's characters' weird doings and wacky sudden reactions!
As an actor, Cassavetes gave a commanding performance as the pleasure-seeking writer Robert Harmon, although I wasn't invested in his character, and his story, not even a tiny bit! What makes the things worse is that the movie focuses on Robert Harmon's life for most of its runtime. Actually, the second act is almost only about him, and I was lost for the most part. On the other hand, I found Sarah Lawson's story quite interesting. Adding to that, Gena Rowlands mesmerized me with her soulful and moving performance. I feel so ashamed of myself because this is the first movie I watch for her. I really can't wait to watch A Woman Under the Influence, another Cassavetes's film that Rowlands arguably gave in the best performance in her career, nay one of the best performances by an actress in a leading role ever!
The third act is by far the best part of the movie. The visual and allegorical imagery in it is one of the best I've seen in film. Some scenes reminded me of Lynch, but of course they are not this disturbing! The allegories used in this act are so subtle and genius, yet so easy to be understood, and can directly make you related to the characters, feel their emotions, and think of what they are thinking about, and that's definitely a proof that the main characters are well-rounded and established so well throughout the movie. That being said, there are some exposition to make the allegories more clear, which I found completely unnecessary as long as I already understand what's displayed on screen.
(8/10)
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
02/07/23
Full Review
Audience Member
I applaud what he was trying to do but I didn't buy any of it. Perhaps losing a solid half hour to and hour of this movie would have made it less odious but then again it's just a movie about fucked up people fucking up. I wish there had been any more insight to the how's and whys of these siblings, as opposed to only the juxtaposition of their existences. I also just found them to be closer to caricatures than believable but at the same time Cassavetes at least never makes them laughable.
You'll do a lot of sighing and looking at your watch while watching this movie, and in a lot of ways I think that's the point-but it's just not my idea of a point worth making.
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
02/06/23
Full Review
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