| Introduction | Chap.1 | Chap.2 | Chap.3 | Chap.4 | Conclusion |
4. Introduction
In the previous chapter, we examined laughter and dance as Cassavetesf
favorite motifs and tools for expressing charactersf hidden emotion.
In this chapter, Cassavetesf favorite theme will be explored.
Most of his films involve middle-class family drama. Occasionally,
a melodramatic tendency can be seen in his films, but this melodrama
is ironically united with real life in its own way. In a sense,
the term gmelodramah covers every film of his. Hence it is important
to draw attention to the relationship between melodrama and real
life in this chapter. In section one, certain melodramatic elements
in Cassavetesf films are examined. In section two, family drama
is discussed.
4.1. Melodrama and Cassavetesf Films
4.1.1. Melodramatic Characters and the Destruction of Melodramatic Structure
Before looking at melodramatic structure in Cassavetesf films,
it would be useful to define what a melodrama is. @At first, we
should recognize the difference between a melodrama and a tragedy.
gIn tragedy, the conflict is within man; in melodrama, it is between
men, or between men and things.
Tragedy is concerned with the nature of man, melodrama with the
habits of men (and things)h.35 According to Jean-Marie Thomasseau, a
French literary scholar of melodrama, a characteristic of melodrama
consists in shifting quiet scenes and scenes with many actions,
gay scenes and touching scenes alternately. In this way, their
contrast is intensified. Melodrama sways the audience emotionally.
In addition, it prevents the audience from thinking logically
by providing many unreal highlighted scenes and allows the audience
to become sentimental.36
What is also characteristic of melodrama is that gthe melodramatic
text is balanced on the edge of two extremes, one of which is
inertial (the paralysis of the system, its resistance to change
or any form of external development) and the other of which is
entropic (where action is expressed only as an irrational and
undirected surplus energy)h.37
In this respect, reference to Thomas Elsaesserfs article about
melodrama-based film, whose article is considered as a classic
is used. In Elsaesserfs view,
[W]hen in ordinary language we call something melodramatic, what
we mean is an exaggerated rise-and-fall pattern in human actions
and emotional responses, a from-the-sublime-to-the-ridiculous
movement, a foreshortening of lived time in favor of intensity
- all of which produces a graph of much greater fluctuation, a
quick swing from one extreme to the other than is considered natural,
realistic or in conformity with literary standards of verisimilitude.38
It should be added that melodrama has many sub-genres such
as family-melodrama, love-melodrama and musical-melodrama and
so on. Especially, family-melodrama has been innovated in its
original way.
In Elsaesserfs opinion, in the family melodrama,
[T]he social pressures are such, the frame of respectability so
sharply defined that the range of estrongf actions is limited.
The tellingly impotent gesture, the social gaffe, the hysterical
outburst replaces any more directly liberating or self-annihilating
action, and the cathartic violence of a shoot-out or a chase becomes
an inner violence, often one which the characters turn against
themselves.39
We should now turn our attention to how the family melodrama
ends.
As seen in the previous chapters, most of Cassavetesf films should
be considered as family dramas. In the following section, the
relationship between melodramatic structure and family drama in
Cassavetesf films is explored. Firstly, in Shadows, melodramatic
signs are obvious. Raymond Carney argued that it was Shadows that
cleverly revealed melodramatic structure in real life. In the
film, acknowledging the existence of the melodramatic element,
Cassavetes draws comedy from such a melodramatic element.40 To put it more clearly, Leliafs superfluous
performance and Tonyfs would-be manliness should be considered
as melodramatic signs invading real life. When we recall the scene
in which Leria and Tony make love, after sexual intercourse, Leria
finds that Tonyfs eagerness to have her has already dissipated.
What Leria portrays is on two levels: a betrayed woman and a frightened
child. What turns out to be comical is that Leria pretends that
she has experienced sexual relations before and moans exaggeratedly
throughout the act. In the meantime, Tony is at a loss for an
answer to Leriafs insistence that they should live together because
they have had sexual intercourse, but he soon pretends as a broad-minded
man and soothes her. Here, Leriafs exaggerated moaning and Tonyfs
unbelievable manliness should be considered as melodramatic. In
that sense, melodrama is impliedly deformed and results in comedy.
In Too Late Blues, Cassavetesf second film, the melodramatic construction
can be noticed from the first half. The heroine Jessica appears
as beautiful, but she is so weak that she cannot live without
the protection of men. She is deserted by two men and has ruined
herself by becoming a whore. She expresses herself as a typical,
poor, weak and passive heroine. In contrast, the hero, Ghost displays
manly power and manages to control his band, his friend and his
girlfriend, Jessica.
Ironically, Ghost has to uncover his cowardliness when he cannot
beat the man who has beaten him in front of his girlfriend. The
tone of the film changes after this scene. The full-of-hope young
band-men turn into cynic and depressed adults. Ghostfs phony manliness
directs the first half of the story, but when his manliness turns
out to be a fake, the story develops by its own way. Ghost becomes
a gigolo, far from being manly. He literally becomes a ghost who
only reflects his own shadowy ego. However, he might have lost
his manliness but not his pride as a jazzman. He becomes a true
jazz- man that probes his identity after he has been disgraced
by his former manager, Benny. The interesting scene in which the
Countess, the patron of Ghost forces Ghost to stare the mirror
to face his real situation, appears after Ghost has lost face
by Bennyfs appearance. Ghost has to watch real life which is given
to him in the mirror. He might see in the mirror that false self
which is made by his make-believe exterior. Also, the story line
of the film follows the typical young-initiation film: full of
conceit, failure, regret and awakening. Accordingly, this film
can be defined as a young-adults-centered melodrama.
In another way, Too Late Blues can be considered a family drama.
A beautiful and attractive woman steps into a family (the jazz
band) that has no female members. Ghost plays the fatherfs role.
Jessica is the mother and also the childrenfs common lover. The
problem is that the children and the father hold her in common
in sexual relations. The family union breaks up. The father turns
out to be a despot and is left alone. The ending of this film
can be defined as an ambiguous one, because when Ghost and Jessica
go to a dingy nightclub where his members are playing, he apologizes
to them and Jessica sings with the music. The members do not allow
Ghost and tell him to go away but Ghost stays there. This ending,
which is recognized as different from a happy ending of ordinary
Hollywood melodrama, may be open to the future. We can find curious
change in the ending by Cassavetesf intention. According to Carney,
in the synopsis of the film before releasing it, the ending was
a bittersweet happy ending that Ghost plays the piano together
with the members at last.41 Avoiding
easy happy ending, Cassavetes increases possibility of interpreting
several ways of future. This impossibility to predict the ending
has something to do with his fondness of improvisation. Moreover,
this ending suggests the charactersf situation which is difficult
to escape from real life. The character cannot flee from harsh
reality easily in Cassavetesf film.
Speaking of ending in Cassavetesf films, we can find three types
of ending: ambiguous ending, happy ending, and unfeasible happy
ending. We can safely say that the endings of films such as Opening
Night and Big Trouble may be defined as happy endings. For the
example of unfeasible happy endings, Minnie@and Moskowitz and
Gloria should be noticed. What we call unfeasible ending here
is that continuity of time is not maintained until the ending
part and a jump in the plot is recognized. In Minnie@and Moskowitz,
after the wedding scene of the couple, Minnie and Seymour, the
next scene shows us the couple, their kids and their mothers in
a country house. Time interval and transition of place are two
elements that make unfeasible happy ending. As for ambiguous ending,
we may find this type of ending in most of Cassavetes films. For
instance, at the endings of Shadows, A Woman Under the Influence
and Love Streams, we are able to find some possibilities of hopeful
future, but these possibilities are not enough to determine the
ending of the film as happy ending. Or at the endings of A Child
is Waiting and The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, we possibly notice
some negative factors about future, but they are not decisive.
Furthermore, regarding the ending of Faces, the protagonists are
in the dangling situation.
What we draw from the style of endings in Cassavetesf films is
that he ingeniously avoids easy endings and let the audience imagine
plausible endings. He shows another type of ending which is neither
sad nor happy. In a sense, the ending of his film does not tell
us the end of the story as if real life does not end but continues.
His film depicts streams of the charactersf emotion. In the same
way, the endings of his films let us feel the endless stream of
life.
Minnie@and Moskowitz should be considered as screwball comedy
which at the same time includes melodramatic parody. In a sense,
this drama is produced from a sudden encounter of the melodrama
and anti-melodrama. Minnie represents a dreamy, vulnerable and
melodramatic spirit. Seymour expresses practical thinking and
violence. Each@time Minnie creates a romantic atmosphere, Seymour
destroys it. The melodramatic situations, such as the meaningless
depression of Minnie and over-acted moving scenes of the lovers
are often interrupted by Seymourfs violent acts and words. Confusion
exists in this film; the characters who adore melodramatic world
declare that melodrama does not exist in the real world. Minnie
longs for romantic love, but she is beaten and yelled at by male
characters. Seymour is far from being a strong, wealthy and romantic
man. We are forced to see the gap between melodrama (cinema) and
real life in this film.
As an example, in the driving scene, Minnie and Seymour drive
the car beneath the sparkling stars accompanied by the Viennese
waltz. The atmosphere is absolutely romantic until Seymour abruptly
turns off the radio. Because of his action, we cannot help coming
back to a realistic situation. After they have pulled over the
car, Minnie tries to talk about their future, but Seymour interrupts
and suggests running away together. The motif of music from a
car radio can also be seen in Love Streams. Creating a romantic
atmosphere and then breaking it unexpectedly seems to be one of
Cassavetesf favorite ways of showing the gap between the melodramatic
world and real life. It is a Brechtian way to show the dual aspects
of life: may be partly comical and partly cruel.
In Love Streams, melodramatic elements may be condensed in Sarahfs
third dream, the operetta scene. Firstly, we hear and see Sarahfs
confessional song of excessive love and then her husbandfs taking
her daughter from Sarah and finally we see the familyfs reunion.
Sarahfs daughter stays away from Sarah, and after a while, her
husband and daughter need her. What should be noted in Love Streams
is that melodramatic factors are included in the dream sequences.
It may be completely separated from real life. In the films which
were made before Love Streams, melodrama and real life co-existed.
But in Love Streams melodrama and real life cannot exist together.
Regarding the origin of melodrama, melodrama used to be accompanied
by music (songs) and dance (ballet). It is obvious that Cassavetes
purposefully designed the dream sequence as melodrama in its original
sense of the word.
Cassavetes said about his films and melodrama as follows:
Les films doivent aller au-dela du melodrame pour explorer cette
source eternelle de problemes et de conflicts mineurs qui forment
le tissu de la vie. . . Dans Love Streams, par example, il nfy
a pas de melodrame . . . simplement une sincerite toujours mal
placee.42
For Cassavetes, his films may delve into problems much more than
usual melodrama-based films. The charactersf overabundant emotion
sometimes gets us to consider that Cassavetesf drama may be closer
to family melodrama than any typical Hollywood film in that it
strategically overuses melodramatic elements.
4.1.2. Stairs as Melodramatic Props
Stairs are often used as important props in melodrama-based
films. The talented filmmaker Nicholas Ray frequently used stairs
for the purpose of intensifying the audiencefs emotion. In family
dramas, stairs function as a privileged topos. According to Thomas
Elsaesser,
This letting-the-emotions-rise and then cringing them suddenly
down with a thump is an extreme example of dramatic discontinuity,
and a similar, vertiginous drop in the emotional temperature punctuates
a good many melodramas - almost invariably played out against
the vertical axis of a staircase. 43
It seems effective to turn now to Nicholas Rayfs representative
use of stairs, in Rebel without a Cause. We possibly find seven
scenes which are filmed near or on stairs. It can be said that
most of the dramatic moments are the scenes with stairs. As an
illustration, when the protagonist, Jim, who cannot decide whether
he should go and fight with a bad boy in the high school, he goes
up and down the stairs. This scene longs about four minutes. Jimfs
going up and down the stairs illustrates his dangling mind between
two possible decisions. As another example, when Jimfs friend
who accidentally finds a gun goes out from home with the gun,
he runs down the stairs. In the last part of the film, he happens
to shoot the bad boy at a ruined house, he discharges a gun at
the stairs. The bad boy falls off the stairs. The sudden-rushing
up and sudden-fall intensify dramatic atmosphere and make the
air strained. To put it briefly, Nicholas Rayfs use of stairs
visually corresponds with the intention of the melodrama: to agitate
the audiencefs feeling. At the same time, going up and down the
stairs repeatedly lets the audience share the characterfs dangling
situation. Stairs are used successfully in Rayfs film on the point
that the stairs become visual metaphors of the charactersf feelings
or they can change the atmosphere of the scene with sudden action
and sound.
As Raymond Carney points out, Cassavetes also makes use of stairs
quite often in his films.44 Here
the function of stairs in his films is explored by considering
the unique way in which he uses stairs in comparison with their
ordinary use. The stairs in Cassavetesf films are employed as
the barometer of the emotional tension experienced by the characters
within the situation. When a character becomes excited, he/she
goes up the stairs as the character in Nicholas Rayfs Rebel Without
a Cause.
Stairs connect the upper space and the lower space. Stairs mediate
between the zenith and the depth of the charactersf emotion, so
to speak. The characters run up and fall down from the stairs.
The charactersf tension rise in the middle of the stairs and the
tension reaches its peak when they reach the upper floor. Stairs
visually embody the charactersf inner turmoil between the uppermost
and the lowermost. Cassavetes seems to prefer the goverlookh shot
from the upper floor, because we can overlook the conflict between
the characters or view the charactersf complications between two
poles of emotion.
In the last sequence of Faces, Richard and Maria both spend a
great deal of time on the stairs. They repeatedly go up and down
the stairs passing by each other. Aware of each partnerfs non-chastity,
they have to decide their future as husband and wife. They even
sit on the stairs in thereby the same posture wondering, and passing
by each other. The stairs symbolize the middle position and the
dangling situation, and the upper floor and the lower floor symbolize
the two possible aspects of their future.
Stairs are sometimes used for tantalizing the audience. In Opening
Night, the important phone from Myrtle rings off-screen and the
phone itself is located upstairs. Cassavetesf camera follows Manefs
running to the phone for quite a long time. We, the audience have
to wait until he finally gets to the phone. Of course, he runs
up the stairs. The necessity that the phone should be located
upstairs in the diegetic world of film cannot be found. The reason
for using the stairs is to increase the thrill or expectation
of the audience.
In@Minnie@and Moskowitz, the staircase in Minniefs apartment is
used for dramatizing scenes like in a melodrama-based film. The
lovers embrace and chase each other there. Minnie in Seymourfs
arms goes up the stairs to the bedroom.
In Big Trouble, when Leonard and Steve break into the insurance
company presidentfs house, a surprise birthday party is taking
place and all friends and relatives are lining up on the stairs.
This scene is an accidental happening that may cause a laugh.
But what we get from this scene might be the embodiment of the
theme of the family (friends) union and the parties of which Cassavetes
is fond.
As seen in the first section, Cassavetes makes use of melodramatic
elements in his own way. He also uses the stairs as typical melodramatic
props. His characters full of excessive emotion go up and down
the stairs frequently. The sound produced in going up and down
the stairs adds to the dramatic atmosphere.
4.2. What is Cassavetesf Family Drama?
4.2.1. Family Melodrama and Cassavetesf Family Drama
Most of Cassavetesf films take up family issues including children.
Basically family melodrama depicts love affairs, marriage and
family life; namely, the change of generation. What should be
of concern in family drama is hthe survival of the family unit
and the possibility of individuals acquiring an identity which
is also a place within the system, a place in which they can both
be ethemselvesf and eat homefg.45 In Cassavetesf family drama, the characters
tend to seek the ideal of a family to search for their own identity.
This tendency may be quite similar to that of family melodrama.
In his films, forming a new family means to secure the place where
a character belongs.
The couples, who have no blood relationship, Gloria and Phil in
Gloria(1980), Ms. Hansen and Reuben in A Child is Waiting(1963),
build a mother-child relationship. In Gloria, Phil, a Hispanic
six-year-old boy, whose family was killed by gangsters, tries
to form a new family with Gloria, a middle-aged single woman in
the neighborhood. He says g Gloria, you are my only familyh or
gI will find a new familyh. The family may bring security and
protection for him. He desperately needs to be loved by somebody
in the name of a family.
In general, a family seems to provide a kind of security to family
members, security from danger, loneliness, etc. A family might
be viewed as the protector. But security and freedom cannot be
obtained at the same time. When people want both, it may lead
to the destruction of the family. In A Woman Under the Influence,
we can see this kind of contradiction.
In A Woman Under the Influence, Mabel, a middle-aged housewife
goes insane. She deeply loves her husband and children. Her husbandfs
friends and his mother judge her as mad. If Mabel wants to get
real freedom and regain her true self, she must leave her family.
But she cannot. For women, to marry somebody means to belong to
an outsider's family. Mabel experiences her husbandfs act of betrayal,
the result of which puts her into a mental institute. After a
period of suffering in the institute she is reunited with her
family just like in a family melodrama plot.
4.2.2. Love Streams
The curious coincidence between Love Streams and The Killing
of A Chinese Bookie are noticeable. In the former, Robert and
his girlfriendfs mother have a date in her house when Robertfs
girlfriend is not at home. They dance together. In the latter,
Cosmo has a date with his girlfriendfs mother. In both films,
the mothers seem to be more intimate with their daughterfs boyfriends.
Ironically, Robert could not get affection from Sarah and Albie,
who have a blood relationship with him. This means that the character
is trying to make a family beyond the blood relationship. This
is true in Sarahfs case, too. She rejects her brother Robertfs
proposal that he will love her forever. She goes out with a man
named Ken, who happens to save her from solitude one night.
In the beginning of Love Streams, Robert is walking with Charene,
his secretary, while holding his secretaryfs daughter, Renee.
We wonder whether Robert, Charene and Renee are a family or not.
Carney argues about the relationship between adults and children
in Love Streams:
With two exceptions, there are no truly mature, loving relationships
between adults and children in all of Love Streams. The interchanges
between Susan and her child, and between the Las Vegas chambermaid
and Albie, are the only examples of genuine intimacy and caring
between an adult and a child in the entire movie.46
This may be recognized as an important observation, but there
are more examples to be found. The relationship between Charlene
(the secretary of Robert) and Renee, Susan and her mother also
show us true, mature and loving relationships. In Love Streams,
a mentally ill woman, Sarah, bought many animals, such as a dog,
a horse and a goose. If she can create a new family, which needs
her, it does not matter whether the family consists of animals
or humans.
Love Streams stands out from other Cassavetesf films partly because
it includes unusual dream sequences, and partly because it depicts
a different type of family drama. Actually, if Cassavetesf family-drama
films are classified into two groups; the drama of the family
organizing and that of the family scattering, Love Streams(1984)
and Faces(1968) belong to the latter group. On the other hand,
A Woman Under the Influence(1975), Minnie and Moscowitz(1971),
Shadows(1959) and The Child is Waiting(1963) belong to the former.
In the broader sense that a family-like community can be considered
as a family, Opening Night(1978)and The Killing of the Chinese
Bookie(1978) belong to the former group. To sum up, it is noticeable
that Cassavetes preferred dramas of family organizing or uniting
to those of family scattering. So Love Streams could be an interesting
example in the sense that the film has a pessimistic and relentless
ending as far as the family is concerned. The most noticeable
point is that the main character, Sarah, prefers an unrelated
person to her own brother.
The strange thing is that Robert acts quite@tenderly to Renee,
his secretaryfs daughter and very severely to Albie. This may
result from the fact that Albie is male and Robertfs own son.
Robert cannot act as a tyrant, but rather as a common father.
Raymond Carney describes Robertfs pseudo-family; h[h]e played
the role of a strong and commanding American guy as if he were
a boy emotionally depending on Mammas and sisters who take care
of him and protect himh.47 He is surrounded
by a comfortable gfamilyh who gives him sexual satisfaction and
cares for him in exchange for money. In his pseudo-family, he
is the only male. He and his money make people gather around him.
Albie can be said to be a nuisance in Robertfs harem. Every woman
pays attention to Albie and encourages Robert to treat Albie decently.
In the sense that Robert and Albie need to be cared for by women,
they belong to the same category as that of a boy. Albie clings
to Robertfs waist when they first meet. Robert kneels down and
hugs Albie in the hotel in Las Vegas, when Robert comes back to
the room after having left Albie the night before to spend with
prostitutes. Moreover, this icon in which a person clings to another
personfs body may be one of Cassavetesf favorite icons, which
appear in Gloria and A Woman Under the Influence. Clinging to
another personfs body shows a personfs desperate search for love.
Another thing that can be said about Albie is that for Robert,
Albie was the product of eight years buried past, for Albie was
born by Robertfs second marriage, which broke up eight years ago,
and he has never met Robert since then. Robert does not want to
nor need to become involved in an intimate, deep relationship.
Carney argues about the difference between Robert and Sara as
follows; g[b]ecause Robert has renounced his past, he is asked
to meet up with it again. Because Sarah is trapped in her past,
she is asked to shake loose from ith. 48 Until Albie or Sarah comes to his house,
Robert shuts himself up with many females but none of them were
blood relatives to him. Albie and Sarah come to his house on the
strength of their blood relationship with him.
For Cassavetes, in Love Streams, g[i]l ne reste que le frere et
la s?ur. . . . Robert et Sarah continuent dfessayer, comme nous
tous. Ils continuent dfaller de lfavant, dfessayer de vivre une
vie nouvelle, sans jamais assumer leurs peurs".49
In short, the families which used to be together are dissipated
into individuals. Robert and Sarah continuously try to find a
new family. The French film critic Thierry Jousse argues that
:
[L]a famille nucleaire nfexisite plus; elle a vole en eclats qufon
voudrait recoller. Le sujet de Love Streams, cfest la defection
du noyau familial, avec son cortege de nevroses et le fol espoir
dfune reconstitution ultime de la communaute originelle.50
In Love Streams, the structure of the nuclear family breaks
up. The characters must find a new family style.
In addition, Love Streams betrays the melodramatic convention
that "family melodrama usually ends by guaranteeing the protagonistfs
happiness with the change of generation".51
In Love Streams, the protagonistsf future happiness is not assured
at all. They have to try to continue to search a new family in
place of a new generation of theirs.
| Introduction | Chap.1 | Chap.2 | Chap.3 | Chap.4 | Conclusion |
Notes
35 R.B.
Heilman, Tragedy and Melodrama, qtd. in Laura Mulveyes gNotes
on Sirk and Melodrama.h Home is Where the Heart Is. Ed. Christine
Gledhill. London: British Film Institute, 1987. 77.
36 Jean-Marie Thomasseau, Le Melodrame. Trans. Sinobu Tyujyo.
Tokyo: Syoubun-Sha, 1991. 210. All translations are my own.
37 David. N. Rodowick, gMadness, Authority and Ideology: The
Domestic Melodrama of the 1950s.h Home is Where the Heart Is.
Ed. Christine Gledhill. 273.
38 Thomas Elsaesser, gTales of Sound and Fury: Observations
on the Family Drama.h Home is Where the Heart Is. Ed. Christine
Gledhill. 52.
39 Ibid., 56.
40 Raymond Carney, Cassavetes no Utsusita
America. [American Dreaming: The Films of John Cassavetes and
the American Experience]. 34.
41 Ibid., 72.
42 Raymond
Carney, ed., John Cassavetes: Autoportraits. 18.
43 Elsaesser, op. cit., 60.
44 Raymond Carney, Cassavetes no Utsusita
America. [American Dreaming: The Films of John Cassavetes and
the American Experience]. 306.
45 Geoffrey Nowell-Smith, gMinelli
and Melodrama.h Home is Where the Heart Is. Ed. Christine Gledhill.
73.
46 Raymond Carney, The Films of John
Cassavetes. 239.
47 Raymond Carney, Cassavetes no Utsusita America. [American
Dreaming: The Films of John Cassavetes and the American Experience].
328.
48 Raymond Carney, The Films of John
Cassavetes. 255.
49 Raymond Carney, ed., John Cassavetes: Autoportraits. 37.
50 Jousse, op. cit., 43.
51 Mikiro Kato, Eiga Jyanru Ron[The Genres of Films]. Tokyo:
Heibon Sya, 1996. 192-193. All translations are my own.