The disenchantment of blue collar folk in America's rust belt is front and center in Barbara Loden's 'Wanda'. Divorced factory worker Wanda Goronski (Loden) barely scrapes enough money to attend her court hearing in which she surrenders custody of her children to her ex-husband. She falls in with petty criminal Dennis (Michael Higgins), and they drift from town to town, breaking into cars and committing other petty crimes in order to scrape by.
Barbara Loden, an accomplished model and Broadway actor, not only wrote and directed but also plays the eponymous lead in the film. Wanda is hopelessly passive and observes events without judgement. The film lacks a conventional plot and doesn't explain the unlikely bond between Dennis and Wanda, whose lives are destined to lead to nowhere, as their aimless travels through the economically desolated landscape of 1970s America mirrors their discontent.
By using a single hand held camera, Loden's minimalist cinema verite style elicits naturalistic performances from the two leads. The lack of a soundtrack allows their sparse dialogue to develop the dynamic in a way that feels off-the-cuff. The raw sound quality and 'student-film' aesthetic is heightened with the sounds of everyday life: tolling church bells, the whoosh of speeding cars and the chirping of insects.
Barbara Loden would never make another feature film and died in 1980. Today, 'Wanda' is celebrated as a feminist work; not so much for its narrative, but rather for the fact it was written, directed and acted by a woman in male-dominated Hollywood.
Barbara Loden, an accomplished model and Broadway actor, not only wrote and directed but also plays the eponymous lead in the film. Wanda is hopelessly passive and observes events without judgement. The film lacks a conventional plot and doesn't explain the unlikely bond between Dennis and Wanda, whose lives are destined to lead to nowhere, as their aimless travels through the economically desolated landscape of 1970s America mirrors their discontent.
By using a single hand held camera, Loden's minimalist cinema verite style elicits naturalistic performances from the two leads. The lack of a soundtrack allows their sparse dialogue to develop the dynamic in a way that feels off-the-cuff. The raw sound quality and 'student-film' aesthetic is heightened with the sounds of everyday life: tolling church bells, the whoosh of speeding cars and the chirping of insects.
Barbara Loden would never make another feature film and died in 1980. Today, 'Wanda' is celebrated as a feminist work; not so much for its narrative, but rather for the fact it was written, directed and acted by a woman in male-dominated Hollywood.