Interiors (1978)

Featured Audience Ratings

• Alice S

  
  The darkest and coldest Woody Allen film I've seen to date. It's high drama, courtesy of Ingmar Bergman. The sophistication is less polished than in Match Point, and rightfully so, since the cracks in this family's veneer are more due to internal turmoil (duh, the… More
  The darkest and coldest Woody Allen film I've seen to date. It's high drama, courtesy of Ingmar Bergman. The sophistication is less polished than in Match Point, and rightfully so, since the cracks in this family's veneer are more due to internal turmoil (duh, the title) than external affairs and atmospheres. I love all the silence and noise: the angry scratches of pencil on paper, the sticky screech of unrolling duct tape on window cracks. Although some commenters on IMDb are not fond of Diane Keaton's performance, I think she (and Geraldine Page) present an acting master class. Renata's first monologue just floors me. Keaton's eyes skitter just enough - to her therapist (I'm assuming), to her hands, to the window - to reveal the insecurity that she dare not show often as the eldest child. She uses her cigarettes well too. She holds it nervously in the aforementioned monologue, and in the scene in which the father (played by Juror #4!) reveals his plans to strike out on his own, she ashes her cigarette by rolling it lightly repeatedly - not letting it go out - bored but listening, almost as if she expected the news and doesn't altogether blame her father for it. Since new Flixster doesn't allow comments on friends' reviews, I'd like to address a qualm Ryan Hibbett voiced in his review about how it's never explicitly shown or stated that Eve came to the beach house the night she kills herself. I do believe there is a shot of her, standing in the shadows as Joey speaks to her. Joey senses her mother there without seeing her, but Eve really IS in the house.

• Melvin W

  
  Joey: I feel the need to express something, but I don't know what it is I want to express. Or how to express it. Interiors isn't your average Woody Allen film. It is a true drama, which you can't say about all that many Allen films. There is very little humor here and… More
  Joey: I feel the need to express something, but I don't know what it is I want to express. Or how to express it. Interiors isn't your average Woody Allen film. It is a true drama, which you can't say about all that many Allen films. There is very little humor here and the humor that is in there, is between sophisticated people, about sophisticated subjects. Every single one of these characters is unlikable with only one exception, Pearl. This family is just so fucking bitchy. That is all they do, bitch. Joey has to be the most unlikable realistic woman character I have ever seen.  She is the very definition of the word bitch. She has no real creative talent, yet all she wants to do is create something. One of her sisters(Renata) is a writer, the other(Flynn), an actress. Joey bitches day and night to her boyfriend(Michael) about how great her sisters are. Then she quits every job she gets because it isn't pleasing to her. The only reason I don't like Michael is because he puts up with her. You know he is going to end up marrying her in the future and then something like the events in this movie is going to play out. The event I'm talking about is the divorce of the three sisters parents. If you see and listen to the mother, it is no real surprise why the father wanted to divorce her. The film is extremely well acted and shot, but this isn't my idea of a good movie. It is just way to dull. The only way to describe this movie, is being stuck at you grandma's house with no tv and it is raining outside. The characters, when they aren't bitching, talk about the most uninteresting things, like interior design and their latest book that didn't do well. Despite how much I dislike it, I still found it easy to watch because Allen's writing is pretty good and the actors all do a good job bringing to life their ugly characters. It isn't a movie I would ever watch again, but every Woody Allen movie deserves one viewing.

• Daniel P

  
  Strong ensemble piece lost between Annie Hall and Manhattan in Woody Allen's prolific career, with none of the humour that either of those landmarks is known for, Interiors is a realist, heavily psychologized film that is well made and convincing. You won't exactly enjoy… More
  Strong ensemble piece lost between Annie Hall and Manhattan in Woody Allen's prolific career, with none of the humour that either of those landmarks is known for, Interiors is a realist, heavily psychologized film that is well made and convincing. You won't exactly enjoy watching it, though.

• Drew S

  
  It's...so...DOUR. All these people do is mope. If Interiors was an hour and a half of this depressing family contemplating their lives and problems, then it would have been a complete disaster - a highly literate one, mind, but something tonally flat and bereft of any dynamic or… More
  It's...so...DOUR. All these people do is mope. If Interiors was an hour and a half of this depressing family contemplating their lives and problems, then it would have been a complete disaster - a highly literate one, mind, but something tonally flat and bereft of any dynamic or dramatic impetus. Maureen Stapleton is the film's saving grace, a deceptively observant burst of vigor introduced at about the halfway mark. She shakes this stultified, miserable social unit right to its core. Though the costume design, placing her in vibrant reds and pinks to contrast with the oppressive beiges and grays she's surrounded by, does her subtlety no favors, she immediately paints a portrait of a woman who knows what's going on but is too considerate to call anyone out for it. Stapleton aside, the acting is uniformly excellent, and Woody Allen does an excellent job of unfurling each characters' challenges and neuroses through the course of the narrative. This is a difficult film to get through, though, both as a Woody Allen piece (his trademark incisive humor is almost totally absent) and as a suffocating chamber drama - enter at your own risk.

• Steven C

  
  One of Woody Allen's true, unadulterated dramas. "Interiors" is good for the simple fact that it has great actors delivering great lines in monologue. Gordon Willis' camera creates a nicely claustrophobic atmosphere. This is certainly melodrama, but it's well… More
  One of Woody Allen's true, unadulterated dramas. "Interiors" is good for the simple fact that it has great actors delivering great lines in monologue. Gordon Willis' camera creates a nicely claustrophobic atmosphere. This is certainly melodrama, but it's well crafted, psychologically engaging melodrama.

• Ken S

  
  Every bit as depressing and well crafted as you'd expect from a Woody Bergman film

• Jennifer X

  
  Certainly had more than a little Bergmanesque feel about it. Woody got the atmosphere right but slopped it over too liberally so the entire movie felt too repressive and dysphoric. He wasn't trained to do a film like this after such a short while but he makes a good go at it. His… More
  Certainly had more than a little Bergmanesque feel about it. Woody got the atmosphere right but slopped it over too liberally so the entire movie felt too repressive and dysphoric. He wasn't trained to do a film like this after such a short while but he makes a good go at it. His best characterization was that of Mary Beth Hurt's, who had so much soul but no outlet to let it out. I think it was because I identified with her.

• jay n

  
  exceptional talent involved but dreary almost suffocating until Maureen Stapleton shows up

• Joey N

  
  Startlingly serious and exceptionally talky, this is not your typical Allen film. Well, let me rephrase that. The characters and situations are very Allen-esque. But instead of comic relief that can help the viewer ignore the tragedies and intense frustrations that the characters… More
  Startlingly serious and exceptionally talky, this is not your typical Allen film. Well, let me rephrase that. The characters and situations are very Allen-esque. But instead of comic relief that can help the viewer ignore the tragedies and intense frustrations that the characters experiences, you are forced here to take them seriously. This may be the strongest acting I've seen in one of his films, excluding some broad comic roles (hello Dianne Weist). A somber, bitter experience.

• Alec B

  
  Following Annie Hall, Woody Allen could have done anything, he choose something far more serious than his other films and he succeeds quite well. I think there are people who would find this film an exercise in boredom, but if you love character studies see this film. I think so much… More
  Following Annie Hall, Woody Allen could have done anything, he choose something far more serious than his other films and he succeeds quite well. I think there are people who would find this film an exercise in boredom, but if you love character studies see this film. I think so much of what plays out is very real and the end is so sad and at the same time it gives real closure to the film.

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