# A Woman Under the Influence
**A Woman Under the Influence** is a 1974 American drama film written and directed by [John Cassavetes](https://www.edgepedia.org/john-cassavetes), starring [Gena Rowlands](https://www.edgepedia.org/gena-rowlands) as Mabel Longhetti, a suburban housewife whose emotional breakdown strains her working-class family, and [Peter Falk](https://www.edgepedia.org/peter-falk) as her husband Nick, a Los Angeles construction foreman.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE) It was the fourth feature collaboration between Cassavetes and Rowlands, who were married, and it became one of the best-known works of American independent cinema.[2](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMAN-UNDER-THE-INFLUENCE?cxt=filmography)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Release | New York Film Festival screening 12 October 1974; New York and Los Angeles openings 12 November 1974[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE) |
| Running time | Listed as 147 or 155 minutes; the original New York Film Festival cut ran 2 hours 35 minutes[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE) |
| Principal cast | Peter Falk (Nick Longhetti), Gena Rowlands (Mabel Longhetti), Fred Draper, Lady Rowlands, Katherine Cassavetes[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE) |
| Financing | Personally financed by Cassavetes, who mortgaged his house; Peter Falk put up $500,000 of his own money[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence) |
| Distribution | No distributor would take it; Cassavetes released it himself through Faces International Films, Inc.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE) |
| Awards | Academy Award nominations for Rowlands (Best Actress) and Cassavetes (Best Director); Rowlands won a Golden Globe for Best Actress[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence) |
| Standing | Ranked =114 in the 2022 BFI critics' poll of the greatest films and =18 in the 2022 directors' poll[4](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/59ac010c-250e-5a0e-8cdf-65c3c5217634/a-woman-under-the-influence) |
## Spoilers
### Story and style
The film follows Mabel Longhetti, a mother of three whose increasingly unstable behavior, especially in company, convinces Nick that she poses a danger to their family; he commits her to an institution for six months and raises the children alone until her return.[5](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/woman_under_the_influence) The couple love each other but cannot express that love in terms the other understands, and the film charts the domestic turmoil that follows her release.[6](https://www.criterion.com/films/510-a-woman-under-the-influence)
Despite its seemingly improvisational quality, the film's dialogue is scripted and its performances carefully rehearsed.[15](https://harvardfilmarchive.org/calendar/a-woman-under-the-influence-2025-05) Long scenes probe the family's daily life, from explosive confrontations to trivial domestic moments, and the film's shape is defined by emotional upheaval rather than plot.[7](https://watch.afi.com/movie/a-woman-under-the-influence) Cassavetes cast friends and family: his mother Katherine Cassavetes played Mama Longhetti, Rowlands's mother Lady Rowlands played Martha Mortensen, and the couple's children appeared in the cast.[2](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMAN-UNDER-THE-INFLUENCE?cxt=filmography) • [3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence) Casting Falk, then midway through his fourth season as television's Lt. Columbo, against type added further tension.[8](https://bfidatadigipres.github.io/discomfort%20movies/2024/07/07/woman-under-the-influence/)
### Interpretation
The film divided second-wave feminists, some reading it as the portrait of a neglected housewife. The film scholar Ray Carney, in an essay for the Library of Congress National Film Preservation Board, argued instead that Mabel was an artistic self-portrait of Cassavetes himself, with Rowlands's personality represented, to the extent it appears, by the cautious husband Nick; Carney connected the character to Cassavetes's own extreme mood swings and nonconformity.[11](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/woman_under_influence.pdf) Other scholarship has read the film as an artifact of 1970s US feminism, examining its emphasis on performance and gesture and the stigma surrounding psychiatric conditions.[12](https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/703500) • [13](https://journalhosting.ucalgary.ca/index.php/jah/article/view/84703)
## Production
The project began when Rowlands told Cassavetes she wanted to do a play about the difficulties women were facing at the time. He handed her a script so intense that she said performing it eight times a week would require hospitalizing her, so he turned it into a film instead.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence) Hollywood financiers declined; Cassavetes was told, in his account, that "No one wants to see a crazy, middle-aged dame."[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence)
**Self-financing.** Cassavetes broke the rule he described as fundamental in filmmaking, never using his own money, by mortgaging his house and recruiting friends. Falk read the script, turned down a role in *Day of the Dolphin* (1973), and put up half a million dollars.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence) The AFI Catalog records that some post-release articles reported Falk's contribution to the financing, and that Cassavetes later said the film took thirteen weeks to shoot, with pre-production and post-production financial challenges keeping it from completion for nearly two years.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE)
Cassavetes was the [American Film Institute](https://www.edgepedia.org/american-film-institute)'s first filmmaker-in-residence at its Center for Advanced Film Studies, and the crew mixed professionals with AFI students; he did most of the editing on the AFI's eighteen-acre estate over roughly two years. Unable to find studio space, the company filmed the Longhetti home scenes in a run-down house on Taft Avenue, just off [Hollywood Boulevard](https://www.edgepedia.org/hollywood-boulevard). With no budget for hair and makeup, Rowlands did her own, and her single set of costumes went to an overnight dry cleaner after each shoot.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence) Bo Harwood composed the music and handled sound.[9](https://www.lpafilmfestival.com/en/a-woman-under-the-influence/)
## Distribution and reception
After the [New York Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/new-york-film-festival) premiere drew strong critical and public response, no distribution offers came. Cassavetes distributed the film himself in the Los Angeles and New York markets through his company Faces International, Inc.; a February 1975 *Daily Variety* article reported that distributors kept rejecting the film because, as they told him, "Nobody's interested in women's problems."[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE) Jeff Lipsky, a college student hired to help distribute it, called it the first time an independent film was distributed without a nationwide system of sub-distributors.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence) The film recouped its $1 million cost, turned a profit, and earned the two Academy Award nominations.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence) Rowlands lost the Best Actress Oscar to [Ellen Burstyn](https://www.edgepedia.org/ellen-burstyn) for *Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore*.[10](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/john-gena-dynamite-screen)
Critical response has remained strong. Rotten Tomatoes lists an 88% Tomatometer from 41 reviews, with the critics' consensus crediting "searing performances from Gena Rowlands and Peter Falk" and Cassavetes "working at his artistic peak."[5](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/woman_under_the_influence) In the [British Film Institute](https://www.edgepedia.org/british-film-institute)'s 2022 [Sight and Sound](https://www.edgepedia.org/sight-and-sound) greatest-films poll, the film ranked =114 among critics and =18 among directors.[4](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/59ac010c-250e-5a0e-8cdf-65c3c5217634/a-woman-under-the-influence)
## Preservation
Cassavetes, and after his death in 1989 Rowlands, guarded the film's rights, allowing screenings only at museums or approved retrospectives.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE) A 35mm restoration by the UCLA Film & Television Archive, funded by [The Film Foundation](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-film-foundation) and GUCCI, has circulated in revival screenings.[14](https://bampfa.org/sites/default/files/BAMPFA_Spring_2025_lo_single.pdf) [The Criterion Collection](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-criterion-collection) issued the film on Blu-ray with a commentary by sound recordist and composer Bo Harwood and camera operator Michael Ferris, a conversation between Rowlands and Falk, and an archival 1975 interview with Cassavetes.[6](https://www.criterion.com/films/510-a-woman-under-the-influence)
## References
1. [A Woman Under the Influence (1974), AFI Catalog of Feature Films](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMANUNDERTHEINFLUENCE)
2. [A Woman Under the Influence, AFI Catalog (filmography view)](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55317-A-WOMAN-UNDER-THE-INFLUENCE?cxt=filmography)
3. [A Woman Under the Influence, Turner Classic Movies article by Lorraine LoBianco](https://www.tcm.com/articles/138056/a-woman-under-the-influence)
4. [A Woman under the Influence (1974), British Film Institute](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/59ac010c-250e-5a0e-8cdf-65c3c5217634/a-woman-under-the-influence)
5. [A Woman Under the Influence, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/woman_under_the_influence)
6. [A Woman Under the Influence, The Criterion Collection](https://www.criterion.com/films/510-a-woman-under-the-influence)
7. [A Woman Under the Influence, American Film Institute (watch page)](https://watch.afi.com/movie/a-woman-under-the-influence)
8. [A Woman under the Influence, BFI Southbank Programme Notes](https://bfidatadigipres.github.io/discomfort%20movies/2024/07/07/woman-under-the-influence/)
9. [A Woman Under the Influence, Lapa Film Festival](https://www.lpafilmfestival.com/en/a-woman-under-the-influence/)
10. [John + Gena: dynamite on screen and off, BFI](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/john-gena-dynamite-screen)
11. [Film essay for "A Woman Under the Influence" by Ray Carney, Library of Congress National Film Preservation Board](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/woman_under_influence.pdf)
12. [Victoria Hesford, "Gesture, Revolt, and 1970s Feminism in John Cassavetes's A Woman under the Influence," Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 45, no. 1 (2019)](https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/703500)
13. [The Obligation to be "Normal": Mental Disability, Stigma and Shame in Cassavetes' A Woman Under the Influence, Journal of Applied Hermeneutics](https://journalhosting.ucalgary.ca/index.php/jah/article/view/84703)
14. [BAMPFA Spring 2025 film calendar (restoration credits)](https://bampfa.org/sites/default/files/BAMPFA_Spring_2025_lo_single.pdf)
15. [A Woman Under the Influence - Harvard Film Archive](https://harvardfilmarchive.org/calendar/a-woman-under-the-influence-2025-05)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Drama and biographical films (individual works) › Drama films 1970s › Released 1970 to 1974*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license