Given the title and poster, I expected a rom-com, but what I got was a semi-absurdist farce about a bunch of men harassing a woman. Although I guess that’s the essence of most rom-coms anyway. It’s Cassavetes’ What About Bob?. Definitely his greatest comedy.
In some ways, Minnie and Moskowitz feels like a prototype for A Woman Under the Influence (similar to how Lost Highway is a trial run for Mulholland Drive). It’s a lot less focused and doesn’t exude the same directorial confidence that the latter does, but it still plays with the same ideas of miscommunication. Very rarely is there a normal back-and-forth exchange of dialogue. Instead, Minnie, Seymour, Zelmo, etc talk at each other while completely misunderstanding one another. There’s a constant desire to be heard—not one to hear. It’s almost high concept in its consistency in that regard. The same ideas that make this awkwardly hilarious make Under the Influence a tragedy.