Mabel, desperate and lonely, is married to a Los Angeles municipal construction worker, Nick. Increasingly unstable, especially around others, she craves happiness, but her volatile behaviour convinces Nick that she poses a danger to their family and decides to commit her to an institution.

A tornado of raw emotions and virtuosic camerawork, John Cassavetes’s beloved masterpiece charts the disintegration of a Californian housewife. In a volatile yet vulnerable performance that has inspired generations of performers, Gena Rowlands buckles under the impossible weight of crumpled dreams.