JOHN CASSAVETES, SUSAN SARANDON & MOLLY RINGWALD 'TEMPEST'

Title: TEMPEST Year: 1981 Rating: ***1/2

“Show me,” says John Cassavete’s intensely desperate character each time a tempest brews: once in New York, where he’s married to Gena Rowlands; the next on a tiny Greek island he lords over with frustrated daughter Molly Ringwald, sexy girlfriend Susan Sarandon, and horny goat herder Raul Julia...

 

The best aspects of this unique dark comedy are how the time-frames are edited together, beginning with Cassavetes on his island; then going back in time to New York where he, as a frustrated Architect, desperately needs a getaway: creatively sustaining past and present till the mainline story connects...

Susan Sarandon and Molly Ringwald in TEMPEST

Loosely based on a William Shakespeare play, the big-budget-widescreen yet alternative-arthouse direction of Paul Mazursky can be self absorbed, but centering on a control freak's drive for personal freedom, it pretty much fits...

 

And one particular scene, as an angry Cassavetes storms after Raul Julia for making a pass at his daughter… cutting to a montage of both characters initially bonding… is, like much of the film, a sublime marriage of editor and director that sadly breaks down in the third act when all characters converge... who were all better off separated.

Molly Ringwald in TEMPEST with Raul Julia

Molly Ringwald in TEMPEST

John Cassavetes and Gene Rowlands with Molly Ringwald in TEMPEST

John Cassavetes and Susan Sarandon in TEMPEST

Lucianne Buchanan and Raul Julia in TEMPEST

Lucianne Buchanan and Raul Julia in TEMPEST

Raul Julia from another intelligent comedy on The Bob Newhart Show circa 1974