3 Women (Robert Altman, 1977)

The seventies are considered by many as the most important decade for the American film. A statement I can understand, but somehow most of the typical movies from this period rarely rank as my favorites. The best example is probably The Godfather, a good movie, but in my opinion overrated and not as good or influential as a handful of movies from the 40’s, 50’s or 60’s. I guess I am a bit prejudiced about this movie era. Trying to prove myself wrong I keep searching for pearls that were made in this time period. My quest led me to a very interesting filmmaker that I know mainly from his 90’s movies: Robert Altman.

His 3 Women was on top of my ‘to watch’ list since it deals with themes (dreams, women, surrealism, identity swapping) that can be found in some of my favourite movies (Persona, Mulholland Drive).  I can say that this one completely fulfilled my expectations and makes me want to watch more and more of Altman’s movies from the 1970’s.

The story initially revolves around 2 Women, one is the young girl Pinky (Sissy Spacek) who applies for a job in a luxueus spa/nursing home. On her first day she meets the experienced Millie (Shelley Duvall). Pinky is showing a more than conventional interest in her colleague and when she posts an add where she is looking for a roommate, Pinky applies and soon the two girls are living together. We see how they are visiting a ranch that is managed by the owners of their appartment, the male of the couple, Edgar, is showing an interest in both girls and his pregnant wife is nothing but silent, and draws beautiful wall and floor paintings. Slowly Millie is more and more trying to dominate the quiet Pinky and when Millie brings home Edgar, she kicks Pinky out of the house. The disappointed girl jumps in the pool resulting in a coma. When she wakes up from her coma, the roles of the two girls seem to have changed and the movie takes some very interesting turns.

I won’t spoil or interpret any of the movie’s details or twists. I just want to share my enthusiasm. Altman gives us a look into his dreams, he didn’t use a script (something he use to do more often) and says that the movie arose from one of his dreams. The acting from the two lead actresses is superb, Duvall and Spacek are, in my opinion, typically skilled actresses from the seventies that are not, like in current movies, drop-dead-gorgeous but actually can act convincingly and add personality. The tension, adoration, jealousy and frustrations between the two girls requires good acting and the two ladies will not disappoint you one moment.

Not only does this movie revolve around girls, the men that are in this movie are portrayed a bit superficial and dumb, both ignoring and wanting the two girls in their different ‘roles’. Considering this movie being a surrealistic dream, these observations can somehow be considered ‘Freudian’. Combined with the beautiful paintings, drawn by the third silent woman, and the 1001 other smart elements used by Altman (the pink and yellow colouring, the twin colleagues, the abundant presence of water, use of names etc) 3 Women seems to have a lot of room for interpretation and begs to be re-watched. Something I will definitely do in the (near) future, and perhaps I will add it to my favourites among the earlier mentioned Persona and Mulholland Drive, for now:

9/10