The film begins by introducing our hero, Seymour Moskowitz. Except he isn't a hero; he's just a regular everyday guy with his own distinct personality and his fair share of flaws. He's neither likable nor unlikable, but we still feel compelled to watch his story unfold.
Seymour is a professional valet and the way that director John Cassavetes is introduces him is so brilliant that I was immediately and overwhelmingly drawn in. But it's also so subtle that you could easily miss it if you're distracted while watching this movie.
Minnie and Moskowitz is unlike many of Cassavetes' other films in that it's more of a comedy. But it's funny in the way that real life is often funny. Everything that happens in the film and every line of dialogue is totally believable. That's what makes it so great, as so many other comedies fail to adequately capture real life and often don't even attempt to do so.
And overall, this one still has that same old wonderful Cassavetes feel to it, which is indelibly infused in everything the guy made, from comedies like Husbands to crime thrillers like The Killing of a Chinese Bookie. And it has some great music in it that suits the on-screen images exceedingly well.
Much of the film consists of one long conversation after another, often between just two people and often across a table. But the conversations are not boring or rambling or pointless. They're interesting and funny and eye-opening and they're always different. A couple of times we get close to the point where it feels like conversations are about to start going on a bit too long, but they're just so humorous and intriguing that we never actually reach that point. We never want them to stop.
We meet several funny characters in this film, of a type which in another film might feel forced for comedic effect, but here they always feel real and therefore always fit perfectly into the story.
While the story being told in this film—about a man and a woman meeting and falling in love—is nothing new, the way it's told is fresh and original. The structure and style are fun and perfect and so realistic that it's difficult not to enjoy every minute of it. And the love between the two characters is not perfect and not absolute, just like in real life. You really get to see how Cassavetes was totally in control of his film and told the story exactly how he wanted to tell it.
The flow of the story is fairly unpredictable, which is one of the things I love about it. The film's biggest letdown—and the only one I can think of—is the acting, which is usually brilliant but sometimes pretty bad. The lead actors both do great but some of the actors in the smaller roles give some pretty unsatisfactory performances. I got the feeling that they only did a few takes of each scene.
There is one scene in which Moskowitz fights a man in a parking lot that was cut together in such a way that I got that impression that the filmmakers realized too late that they hadn't shot all the footage that they thought they had. A few people complained about this and called it bad editing, but I found the end product to be a unique and innovative solution. Had things gone differently, the scene would have ended up being fairly forgettable, but instead the filmmakers were forced to be creative and it gave the scene a fun and unique flavor, and the film is better for it.
The movie is not too long and not too short. Personally, I would say it has the most perfect pacing of all of Cassavetes' films and I would rank it as his third best, after A Woman Under the Influence and Faces. I recommend it to anyone who likes to laugh or smile occasionally.
Seymour is a professional valet and the way that director John Cassavetes is introduces him is so brilliant that I was immediately and overwhelmingly drawn in. But it's also so subtle that you could easily miss it if you're distracted while watching this movie.
Minnie and Moskowitz is unlike many of Cassavetes' other films in that it's more of a comedy. But it's funny in the way that real life is often funny. Everything that happens in the film and every line of dialogue is totally believable. That's what makes it so great, as so many other comedies fail to adequately capture real life and often don't even attempt to do so.
And overall, this one still has that same old wonderful Cassavetes feel to it, which is indelibly infused in everything the guy made, from comedies like Husbands to crime thrillers like The Killing of a Chinese Bookie. And it has some great music in it that suits the on-screen images exceedingly well.
Much of the film consists of one long conversation after another, often between just two people and often across a table. But the conversations are not boring or rambling or pointless. They're interesting and funny and eye-opening and they're always different. A couple of times we get close to the point where it feels like conversations are about to start going on a bit too long, but they're just so humorous and intriguing that we never actually reach that point. We never want them to stop.
We meet several funny characters in this film, of a type which in another film might feel forced for comedic effect, but here they always feel real and therefore always fit perfectly into the story.
While the story being told in this film—about a man and a woman meeting and falling in love—is nothing new, the way it's told is fresh and original. The structure and style are fun and perfect and so realistic that it's difficult not to enjoy every minute of it. And the love between the two characters is not perfect and not absolute, just like in real life. You really get to see how Cassavetes was totally in control of his film and told the story exactly how he wanted to tell it.
The flow of the story is fairly unpredictable, which is one of the things I love about it. The film's biggest letdown—and the only one I can think of—is the acting, which is usually brilliant but sometimes pretty bad. The lead actors both do great but some of the actors in the smaller roles give some pretty unsatisfactory performances. I got the feeling that they only did a few takes of each scene.
There is one scene in which Moskowitz fights a man in a parking lot that was cut together in such a way that I got that impression that the filmmakers realized too late that they hadn't shot all the footage that they thought they had. A few people complained about this and called it bad editing, but I found the end product to be a unique and innovative solution. Had things gone differently, the scene would have ended up being fairly forgettable, but instead the filmmakers were forced to be creative and it gave the scene a fun and unique flavor, and the film is better for it.
The movie is not too long and not too short. Personally, I would say it has the most perfect pacing of all of Cassavetes' films and I would rank it as his third best, after A Woman Under the Influence and Faces. I recommend it to anyone who likes to laugh or smile occasionally.