Amazon.com Customer Reviews
 Rated 4 out of 5
Out from the Shadows
Cassavetes was just warming up when he made this in the late ’’50s, but what a debut! He’’d have better actors and more focused scenes in future movies, but the willingness to tackle intense subjects in unexpected ways is already here in full force. Race isn’’t so much the issue in "Shadows" as it is an occasion for exploring a whole range of folks uncomfortable in their own skins, from the ’’racist’’ lover who wants Lelia back to the goofy hoods in Ben’’s gang. Cassavetes is especially sensitive to the way that people who are forced to conform to any of society’’s ideas--about the artist, the intellectual or the racial outsider--can be violent in turn towards others. A great taste of the films to come! Rated 5 out of 5!
AWEsome Film
This is a great movie. Like it was made yeserday. Punk, beat in sensibility. About young people struggling on the fringes.Also the review that follows mine is right. A guy named Ray Carney just wrote an amazing book about the movie that has incredible behind the scenes details that no one ever knew before. Cassavetes revealed them to Carney before he died in a Rosebud conversation. Check out the book titled Shadows and another titled Cassavetes on Cassavetes along with the film. It’’s available here if you type in Cassavetes’’ name under books. Also Carney has a web site that you should check out with lots of other Cassavetes material. I love this movie! And the books about it. - Rated 5 out of 5!
FILM GOGGLES
This intense, hysterical, loud, sweet and sour film was NOT an IMPROVISATION despite the end title! Neither were Cassavetes other films, in the classic sense of IMPROV. Improv was sparringly used in the writing of the scripts, but Cassavetes was a WRITER who knew what he was doing more than people give him credit for. This is a major crime against one of the greatest artists of the last 100 years (wha? no, seriously). To get the real scoop, and an exhaustive, loving take on this important first film by an American original, check out the BFI Film Series edition on SHADOWS, which just came out. It breaks it down and builds it back up, in a way you won’’t believe.
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