Thoughts on this jump cut, was it all a dream?

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I know this is a little late (to say the least), but I'll answer as best I can.

No, it wasn't a dream. Cassavettes was dead set against hollywood convention or even art house and hated the sorts of manipulation they employed. He wanted to keep his films "real". He did ease up on this a bit, as can be seen with some of the techniques he used for later films such as "The Killing of a Chinese Bookie" (gel lens for the night club scenes), "Opening Night" (showing us people who exist only in Rowland's mind) and "Love Streams" (the fantasy sequence at the end). Early Cassavettes however would never want to use a dream sequence.

Part of the confusion is editing. The original cut of Faces was eight hours, than down to 220 minutes, than 3 hours, until he finally got down to the 129 minute version most know. I'm guessing this especially for this scene since it's when the editing is most jumpy.

The out of the blue aspect is pure Cassavettes. His characters almost never communicate what they're feeling directly, and there are often sudden reversals because the characters themselves don't know what they want. "Faces" is especially challenging in this regard, because much of the laughter and smiles are masks. The opening with Jim and Jeanie showed his interest in the latter, and the scene following between him and his wife displayed a strained relationship with poor communication. Thus either the sex scene was a moment of false passion, or just a brief flicker that died out when the sex is over.



"It's just you and me now, sport"-Manhunter