Well, it’s a cute idea for a movie, and maybe that’s why they’ve had this particular idea so often. You start with tough-talking, streetwise gangster types, you hook them up with a little kid, you put them in fear of their lives, and then you milk the situation for poignancy, pathos, excitement, comedy and anything else that turns up (…)

Cassavetes has a nice eye for locale. There’s a crummy flophouse where the clerk tells Rowlands, “Just pick a room. They’re all open.” There’s a garishly decorated love nest that Rowlands occasionally occupies with a mobster. There are bus stations, back alleys, dimly lit hallways and the kinds of bars that open at dawn and do most of their business by 9 a.m. (…)

Cassavetes remains one of the most consistently interesting Hollywood mavericks. He makes money by acting and immediately spends it producing his own films. Most of them are passionately indulgent of the actors, who sometimes repay his indulgence with inspired performances (…)

Gloria is tough, sweet and goofy. — Roger Ebert*