Wanda

Wanda's self-worth has been battered down to nothingness. The only thing that seems to drive her is a need to be wanted, no matter how poorly she gets treated. Certainly she is a tragic character and the men in her life are no saints. But much of her trouble seems to be self-inflicted by careless decisions. Loden doesn't make it easy for us to decide how to judge her, and in a way takes the judgment out of the equation. The more I ponder this bleak film, the more intriguing I find it.

Absolute powerhouse freight train from the now alternate universe called the 70s. So fiercely anti-bullshit in its stylistic and thematic conceit it still makes most modern productions seem like all kinds of bad jokes.

Barbara Loden could've been like John Cassavettes--a character actor as well as an indie filmmaker. And her feminist approach could've elevated this from movies like Gun Crazy or Bonnie & Clyde. But her handheld quasi-documentary style is too detached for the story. As such, you don't get any context on the era, gender, or class--to the detriment of the Rust Belt Setting and societal failings of poor women. It gets a marginal recommendation for film students as her skeleton crew worked wonders.

An absolute anti-road movie, close to Visconti's dream of non-film. She escapes her life as a domestic slave and makes thousand miles just to see that she is a slave everywhere. In the tragic determinism of the movie there are either mothers or whores, where we witness W's voyage from former to the latter. What is awesome is that Loden is never didactic and narrates the life of a clever, yet ignorant woman who, somehow achieves to mock and resist men in her everyday practical feminism. Great!

Absolutely singular movie; Loden plops Wanda, aimless and submissive, down in front of us and follows her on a trip through an America where dreams don't extend further than maybe having a goal for the next few days. No commentary, no analysis, just, "here you are." So many incredible details in that grainy 16mm, and fantastically close performances by Loden and Higgins.

Like a feminist Cassavetes with an Antonioni-esque emphasis on environment, Loden paints a portrait of a woman, perpetually lost and forever unwanting and unwanted. She reformulates her identity only in relation to whatever man she’s with or opposed to. She has no control over any aspect of her life - watch as she asks for money in the most indirect way possible. The scene with the toy airplanes in the sky is unforgettably beautiful and a great microcosm of the film as a whole. Masterpiece.

There's much to like about Barbara Loden's lone film --it's a true indie and a scrupulously naturalistic realization that withholds judgment on its characters. True, it has some of the pitfalls of this type of low-budget film --the 16mm blow-up makes it look like crap, and the acting is often so poor it takes you out of the realism the film tries so hard to convey. Most detrimental to my appreciation of the movie is just that I couldn't find much reason to care about Wanda.

Of all the movies that Cassavetes didn't direct, this is one of the most Cassavetyish. Reactions are never forced and everything that's happening feels natural. I read somewhere that this is regarded as a minor masterpiece in France. Don't know about masterpiece tbh, but I sure like this kind of cinema.

Bonnie and Clyde by way of Cassavetes.

a ghost drifts through the rubble of american capitalism and into a crime movie with shades of jost and cassavetes. she begins to take shape, a faint sliver of an outline emerging albeit moulded entirely by her clyde (a disenfranchised creep snatching hopelessly at that american dream flying a little too high overhead), but she's late to her own warped genesis and soon sinks back into the reality of her unbeing. compare and contrast it with JEANNE DIELMAN; double bill it with eklöf's HOLIDAY.

Not restricted by the commercial concerns of a Hollywood studio, Loden enjoys much stylistic freedom, rendering her film with a striking realism. Then there's Wanda: unforgivably self-deprecating, shamelessly relying on others' charity, not particularly attractive; Despite not finding a single alluring feature about her, I couldn't help but encourage her in turning her life around. Loden's impartiality towards her demeanor only amplifies this feeling. Her first/only film, but one to be proud of.

something something something about making a film without a consistent psychology behind it, very nice

watchable

Heartbreaking film. Clearly the world is a dangerous place for a woman on her own, but what makes this work for me is that Loden holds the tension--Wanda appears to have her own hand in her situation. This creates a much more complex situation that speaks to the humanity of the film. Further, this film seems like it informs the work of filmmakers like the Dardennes, Sean Baker, and Andrew Bujalski.

Incredibly bleak, and definitely feels inline with Cassavetes. However, this film feels more aimless, thanks to the aimlessness of Wanda, than any of his work. This feels like a polarizing film.

So much is communicated in Loden's fragile gaze. The nihilistic air of the journey blunts most of the tragic consequence and forces the viewer to truly absorb the tiny fragments of tenderness that pass by.

America at its most nihilistic, and I'm here for it. The budget and its very hands-on approach (16mm on $100K and a 4-member crew) makes this all the more impressive

Like watching a slow trainwreck, Wanda keeps making bad mistake after bad mistake until bad things just happen to her by default. It's unflinching toward her without any of the typical redemption or glorification. If anything, she was probably most at peace with the robber. Fav scene: reading the newspaper and discovering she barkeep wasn't who he appeared to be.

Barbara Loden's only directorial film is rough around the edges, but it bursts with the charm of the early 70's movement. Loden clearly had a lot of talent - she was a triple threat and it's a shame that her career was cut short.

The deliberate pacing isn't always effective in the second half, but everything else is magnificent. It's a character study about a depressed and woman's aimless quest for attachment after her divorce. The film is non-judgmental and while Wanda's no saint she's quite sympathetic in her sad lonely struggle with life. The visual style is very rough but very appropriate, making it feel almost like a documentary, especially for the first half.

I respect Barbara Loden as a trailblazer, but this film just doesn't have anything to make it stand out beyond historical value. Loden's habit of using the camera to linger on listless scenes like characters walking down the street or lying in bed just doesn't feel "earned." She doesn't counterbalance it with anything that drums up interest in the characters or give any weight to the drama. The result just ends up feeling so boring that I found myself counting the minutes until it ended.

Wanda illustrates the fine line often separating gritty realism from naive naturalism. Presumably its acclaim is due to its focus on a poor working class female protagonist living in a rust belt who feels emotionally trapped, leading her directly into the hands of bad men. Comparisons have been made to the 'naturalistic' style of Cassavetes, but that's nonsense: his style had an actual rhythm, this is just point and shoot. Loden is ok in the title role, but the film is amateurish and dull.

Sad sad sad movie

ok. won't be everyone's cup of tea

An interesting vision of the past we don't often see.

A bleak story of a simpleton woman bouncing from place to place and person to person with no plan or goal. This movie is an exercise in patience waiting for something, anything to happen. When it does it leaves you feeling unsatisfied. What was the point?

watched: 2016, 2024

:(

Wanda estreava há 50 anos no Festival de Veneza. Nem sei o que dizer, isso é um retrato tão pujante da merda que é ser mulher dentro do patriarcado e me deixou ainda mais desesperançada do que o usual. Blurayrip no MakingOff.

Bonnie is nuffin compared to Wanda.

Feels like a prototype for Badlands, but is not as good. It's not a bad film by any means, though perhaps a tad over-aggressively dreary. Wanda (a very good Loden) is a pretty interesting damaged character, and her relationship with Mr. Dennis is intriguing. Feels like the kind of film that might improve with more thought.

A fascinating and exceptionally-performed movie with a protagonist who is remarkable for 1970 and, sadly, would still probably not go down well with mainstream audiences today. An absolutely incredible achievement from Loden.

Kael describes Wanda as “a sad, ignorant slut”, which is too harsh, but she has a point: premiering almost simultaneously with FIVE EASY PIECES, this shares the mood of aimlessness and passive rebellion, but the characters and situations are less well-defined (Wanda is almost a cross between the Nicholson and Black characters in Rafelson’s film, but keeping only their least interesting aspects). Just about passable as a first effort, but the reliance on improvisation fails the cost-benefit test.

I normally get a little bored with films with such little plot, but this docudrama somehow kept my attention, probably because I couldn't figure out if Wanda deserved sympathy for her poor situation in life or if she's the root cause of it. I liked the grittiness even through the faux realism.

I'm sorry but to me, this wasn't a good movie, just a very dull one.

I love this film's wild ambition and it's steadfast refusal to play out like a movie. I think it falls just short of being a masterpiece because the non-actors used in pretty much every other role in the film, while adding incredible authenticity, also add a handful of truly terrible performances.

Imagine if John Cassavetes directed Easy Rider. Now imagine if he was a feminist who was making her directorial debut with an even lower budget than normal. Now imagine that film was a misunderstood gem of the time, that she never got the chance to make another film, and that she passed away long before her film was reevaluated and seen for the achievement that it is

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