WHAT HAS BEEN MOST REMARKED AND ADMIRED IN CASSAVETES’ METHOD IS HIS INCORPORATION OF IMPROVISATION WITH CONVENTIONAL FORMS OF STORYTELLING. MINNIE AND MOSKOWITZ MAKES DO WITH A MINIMUM OF STRUCTURE, ITS STORY ONLY EXISTING VERY LOOSELY TO BRING TOGETHER THE UNLIKELIEST OF LOVERS.
Minnie (Gena Rowlands) works in a Los Angeles museum, is coming to the end of a stormy affair with a married man, and is rather reluctantly steered into a date with a businessman (Val Avery). He has a line in aggressive confession which seems on the point of turning to physical violence when Minnie is saved by Seymour Moskowitz (Seymour Cassel), a 30-year-old car park attendant. Rescue does not bring relief: Seymour’s simple manner goes with an explosive way of broaching a relationship and he is quickly provoked by Minnie’s habit of fighting shy of emotional demands. Their subsequent affair does not so much deflate the ideal of romantic cinema (their own movie tastes run to Bogie and the ubiquitous Casablanca) as intertwine with it to satirical effect.