(Robert Altman, US 1977, 124 min., 35mm)
Director Robert Altman famously described the concept for 3 Women, his idiosyncratic follow-up to 1976’s contentious Buffalo Bill and the Indians, as coming to him in a dream. It’s easy to believe when watching the film — a sustained, sun-drenched daydream, with more than a tinge of nightmare. Although unmoored from traditional storytelling techniques, 3 Women finds an emotional anchor in its titular leads: Shelley Duvall, Sissy Spacek, and Janice Rule masterfully embody sensitive strangers who share space in the California desert, as well as sharing much of themselves – perhaps too much. As their identities shift and slip into one another, viewers follow the women deeper into their insular world, carefully crafted by the film’s talent: on set, Altman embraced improvisation and unusual displays of method acting (Duvall, for example, wrote in-character diaries and recipes), leading to a film that feels both truly lived-in and separated from reality. Out of print on home video for many years after release, 3 Women’s mythos only grows larger and stranger with the passage of time.
Introduction by and post-screening discussion with Selznick student Luke Bailey.
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Film Screenings | The Face Behind the Mask (DCP)
Lose Yourself Peter Lorre stars in this cult noir as a Hungarian who takes the slow boat to Manhattan in search of a better life, only to almost immediately have his face horribly disfigured in a tenement fire.