Joanne Woodward starred as Beatrice Hunsdorfer ("Betty the Loon"), a loud, vulgar, gum-chewing, beer-drinking, unattractive middle-aged woman
Living in a dilapidated house in a rundown town, abandoned by her husband, unable to face the responsibility of raising her two teenaged daughters' she is disgusted with life
She covers her despair with sarcasm, outrageous jokes and a tough, insensitive treatment of the girls
But she's also pathetic, as she checks the classified ads for business opportunities, and dreams of opening dignified teashops, even though her house is filled with garbage and she's a frightful mess
The film focuses on the way Beatrice's savage, cynical, often self-deprecating humor and her embittered outlook have affected her daughters. Ruth, the older girl, is a typical adolescent boy-chaser and baton-twirler, who, like Beatrice, employs a tough, sarcastic manner to hide her fears and frustration
Shattered by nightmares and epileptic fits, she sinks hopelessly into defeat
Matilda is shy, sensitive and introverted
Although it seems that she should succumb, she overcomes her environment and emerges strongest
An extremely intelligent science student, Matilda wins a prize for her experiment on mutated flowers that gives the drama its symbolic title; and she becomes a mutant herselfa delicate flower growing out of arid waste
The play is transformed from a lyrical mood-piece into a naturalistic slice-of-life in the tradition of the fifties television drama Newman admires
This makes the symbolism somewhat obtrusive, and the emphasis on external squalorthe filthy house, for exampleis overdone and superficial
Newman's attempts to open up the play are largely successfulscenes of Matilda's science teacher explaining the mysteries of the universe, Ruth's accurate imitation of Beatrice in a school skit, and a teenaged mad scientist explaining with sadistic relish how she skinned a cat, are especially memorable
As in "Sometimes a Great Notion," there's a real feeling for family life, although the emphasis is reversed: here it's a world of women in which men play a marginal role
Newman expertly handles the shifts from vigorous burlesque to black humor to terror to pathos
And as before, he uses the camera functionally, bringing it close to his actresses to achieve intimacy and character revelation
Woodward again displays remarkable range
As the shrewish, noisy woman, she's at once horrifying and humorous, but her suggestion of underlying vulnerability arouses our compassion
There's even the familiar inner radiance, indicating a beautiful woman beneath the flamboyance
As Ruth, Roberta Wallach is a perfect amalgam of the tough, shallow teenager and the pathetic, defenseless baby
The standout performance is by Nell Potts, the Newmans' thirteen-year-old, who played Rachel as a child, and here plays a Rachel-like character
As Matilda, she's a model of understatement, with her soft, fragile voice, subtle expressions of nervousness, and luminous blue eyes that, like her father's, seem to be quietly assimilating everythingsometimes disapproving but more often understanding
The film did reconfirm Newman's stature as a director
In his three features he has shown an ability to work with a wide range of material, and if he lacks an original style, he does have a feeling for constructing powerful images and scenes
Above all, he was one of today's finest directors of performers, which has become almost a lost art
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