Film
Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more
- Home
- Box Office
- Listings
- Trailers
- Features
Bookmark this page- Edition:
Shadows (1959)
Director: John Cassavetes
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
Admirers of Mean Streets may have wondered how Scorsese came by his dizzy vision of nervy New York neurotics: Cassavetes' first film may well have been a strong influence. As in the later film, what matters is less the story - two brothers and a sister working out various tensions between themselves and other friends and lovers - than the electric atmosphere and edgy performances. The trio trudge through their seedy city lives (smoky nightclubs, pretentious parties, disastrous sexual encounters, brawls, and beery beatnik conversations) suffering from heady hypertension, although what is now so surprising about this milestone of improvisational cinema is that it is often very funny. The jumpy editing, free-focus camerawork, and naturalistic dialogue (made the same year as Godard's Breathless, it centres around many of the same impulses towards a new form of film-making) may no longer shock, but back in '59 must have been a revelation. With a blue and moody Mingus soundtrack and steel-grey photography, it's still a delight.Author: GA
Cast & crew
Director: John Cassavetes
Producer: Maurice McEndree
Cast: Lelia Goldoni, Ben Carruthers, Hugh Hurd, Anthony Ray, Rupert Crosse, Tom Allen, Dennis Sallas, David Pokitellow full cast
Duration: 81 mins
Most popular on this site
Features
To the letter
Forty years later, Costa-Gavras's Z still brims with fury.
Mind over matter
David Cronenberg reflects on a most bizarre body: his own corpus of work.
Fool's gold
Can an Oscar win lead to a cursed career? Here are five stories of postaward professional meltdowns.
We are the championed
Terrorists and teens abound in this year's "Film Comment Selects."
A history of violence
Matteo Garrone's kaleidoscopic Gomorrah wallops you with Italy's crime crisis.
True romantic
James Gray exchanges urban amorality for amour in Two Lovers.
Playing in the dark
MoMA salutes pianist Stuart Oderman's 50 years as the one-man sound of silents.
Junk bonds
Cast and crew recall the making of the classic NYC drug drama The Panic in Needle Park.
What do you think?
Post your review now