3 Women

Altman made a lot of films that are obscure and deserve to remain so ("Quintet"), but he also made a lot of films that are obscure but deserve to be seen, and "3 Women" is one of those. It's one of the most fascinating films Altman created, and that's really saying something from a director who was able to make even his bad films fascinating.

Altman claimed that "3 Women" was inspired by a dream he had while his wife was lying ill in a hospital, and the film does indeed work on its audience the way a dream does. It resists literal interpretation, and will probably frustrate any viewer who insists upon tidiness in their movies. It communicates its messages instead through pervasive imagery and tone -- it's not "about" something as much as it's about making you FEEL something, and it does that expertly. This movie will stick in your mind and haunt you long after you've seen it.

If I were forced to explain the film's plot, it would go something like this: Shelley Duvall plays Millie, a rather foolish woman who works in a geriatric physical therapy center, and whose roommate has just moved out to live with her boyfriend. Sissy Spacek plays Pinkie, newly hired at the center and put under Millie's direction. Millie is a pathetic character -- she yammers on endlessly about ridiculously trivial things (like how to make tuna melts) and doesn't realize that everyone around her either ignores her or makes fun of her. But Pinkie nevertheless becomes enamored of her and moves in with her. The third woman of the title is Willie, a reclusive artist who owns both the apartment complex in which Millie and Pinkie live, and a saloon that resembles something from a ghost town. She paints murals of strange-looking mythological creatures engaged in violent and sexual acts. These images recur throughout the film, as do images of water. Everything up to this point in the movie is dealt with in a fairly straightforward manner. But then Pinkie has an accident, and when she wakes up, she's become a different person, causing Millie's hold on reality, already tenuous, to unravel. At this point, the film becomes reminiscent of films like "Persona" and "Mulholland Drive," in which seemingly separate female characters merge into different facets of one female personality.

The ending is creepy and chilling in ways that are hard to define. The whole film has violent undertones -- the lone male character in the film is a lout and vaguely predatory; all of the women at various moments seem to be holding back a barely suppressed rage. Altman uses his camera in his characteristically expert manner to shape our perceptions about what we are seeing, and he uses other parts of his mise-en-scene, like color (Millie's favorite colors are yellow and purple, and look for them in the art direction), to bring a slightly surreal quality to even the most mundane of locations.

I've always thought that Shelley Duvall was an underrated actress, and she gives one of her best performances as Millie (and almost looks pretty for a change). Sissy Spacek is tremendous as well, and shows a remarkable range as Pinkie. Both of these actresses do wonderful things with tough roles, and even if we sometimes feel like we're on uneven footing because of the movie's enigmatic nature, the actresses are so assured in their parts that we can rely on them to guide us through it.

Altman directed a quartet of "dream" films that all revolve around the psychological and emotional crises of women: "That Cold Day in the Park" (1969); "Images" (1972); "Come Back to the 5 & Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean" (1982); and "3 Women." I've not seen "That Cold Day..", but of the other three, though all of them have qualities to recommend them, "3 Women" is easily the best.

Grade: A

Put together a top-shelf Raymond Carver story and the last two reels of 2001 and you have a dim idea of the unique genius of Altman's 1977 masterpiece, probably the most original movie ever made within the studio system. Shelley Duvall is a practiced flirt and would-be social butterfly, oblivious to the total failure of her Donna Reed mystique, and Sissy Spacek is the childlike tag-along who idolizes her. That's all I'll say about the story, which makes turns you couldn't have guessed at in ways that can't be summarized. Humane, funny, staggeringly strange and deeply creepy, THREE WOMEN defines certain social strata and modes of interaction that you've never seen in a movie before or since--and then goes out on a mystical limb that makes the last third of APOCALYPSE NOW look prosaic. With all due respect to NASHVILLE, MCCABE and many others, Altman never made a better film.

I don't feel I can add anything to the excellent commentary by the other reviewers for "3 Women"; I just want to urge film lovers of all stripes to check out Altman't commentary on the Criterion DVD. In the liner notes, they refer to it as "wide-ranging;" it IS that, and expansive, too. It is almost as if Altman was saying to himself, "Well, I'm not going to be around much longer, so I am going to speak my peace about how I feel about film-making and let it all hang out". For the true aficionado, this is as good as it gets. You'll want to savor it in chunks it is so thought-provoking. Not only does Altman reveal all the hidden meanings of the film, he explains at length (with copious examples) the philosophy of his art. It shed light on my previous encounters with Altman's "difficult" style; highly recommended.

We are all on the brink. Many of us have endearing qualities that are lacking in others and vice versa. Do we question ourselves or do we change drastically? Can we become better people or are we doomed with our very own dismal personality traits? These are the questions that the film, 3 Women, examines.

I saw this film as a 14 year old boy with no preconceptions. It made me feel like there were imposter's as well as identity thieves among us all. I even became suspicious of people who I considered to be my allies! A truly, classic piece of cinema paranoia (in the tradition of Polanski's The Tenant). Except in this case, there is no illusion. Just one ,blatant, slap in the face after another. When you watch this film, it will literally shed it's skin and reveal something that is spookily real and very threatening, without all the supernatural riff-raff and far-fetched plot. This is a film about REAL characters and REAL development. The ending can be summed up by the scene which precedes it, in which the three women are brought together by a rather tragic incident, as this breathes new "life" into their bleak, sometimes dusty environments. "One woman became two..Two became three...3 Women became One."

...and creates something even more fascinating than Bergman's film. Although they're not exactly equally themed films, the theme of female identity-swapping is similar in both. "3 Women" is a dark, allegorical and poignant study of loneliness and search for identity. Pinky Rose (Sissy Spacek) is a shy Texan girl who idolizes her pathetic co-worker Millie Lammoreaux (Shelley Duvall), a young woman who's ignored by everybody around her - except Pinky. Pinky soon becomes Millie's new roommate, but their friendship doesn't make Millie feel any less ostracized by her peers, and an extreme act of Pinky will turn everything upside down.

Sissy Spacek, right after the huge hit "Carrie", delivered another unforgettable performance. That's no surprise considering Spacek is one of the finest American actresses of all time; the real surprise here is Shelley Duvall, who usually got small roles in great films and never was considered a great actress. When she had a big role in a Kubrick film (the now classic "The Shining"), everybody hated her, and unfortunately that's what most people remember her for (which is unfair, since she was okay in my books; come on, you'd also act hysterical if your husband was chasing you and your son with an axe!). However, 3 years before "The Shining", Duvall gave a mesmerizing, wonderfully nuanced performance as the pathetic Millie, a cross between Blanche DuBois and Pollyanna. A character that could've been annoying if played by a less talented actress, but that became fascinating in Duvall's body. We all know or met people like Millie at least once in our lives, and at moments you just wish you could give her a hug.

"3 Women" is one of Robert Altman's best, and, consequently, one of the best films of all time. The man who knew how to make ensemble dramas like no other (Nashville, Short Cuts, The Player, Gosford Park, etc.) was also brilliant at creating intimate portraits/character studies. 1 woman became 2/2 women became 3/3 women became 1, which can be summed up by: Birth, growing up, awakening, and (in)stability. The artist, his art, perception, film, and life themselves. 10/10.