Sold as a gangster film when it was released, it is more exactly a feature film on the agony of a character, Cosmo Vitelli, owner of a striptease cabaret in debt up to his neck, and that of a world, that of the night in Los Angeles, which shines one last time before sinking. Ben Gazzara flames, offers orchids, sells wind, until he finds himself having to honor his debt with the underworld by killing a Chinese bookmaker. Asked about his best role at the end of his life, the actor saw in it a form of story about “the endless fight against all these nuisances that prevent you from accomplishing your work”.
It seems that all the personalities gathered there – John Cassavetes, a filmmaker crushed by the Hollywood machine and his own excesses, and Ben Gazzara, an actor who deserved a much better career – suffered from this and that is perhaps what makes this film a masterpiece. As if everyone were drunk, including the chief ops: there are countless lights that are too bright, shots where you can’t see anything, just like at night or when you’re sick with a fever.
Monday April 17 at 8:50 p.m. on Ciné+ Classic. American drama by John Cassavetes (1976). With Ben Gazzara. 1h45. (Multicast and On Demand).
