User Reviews

This is a pure social topic that you have here. A poor lonely woman, not homeless but unemployed robs a bank to survive. How can anyone stay still, feel nothing in front the distress of this poor woma?. You deal here with a poignant, gripping tale in which the audiences may recognize themselves. The scenes of the lead lady, alone in her small flat, alone with her cats, the only human creatures on earth who don't reject her, those sequences are hard to bear. Yes Ken Loach would have been moved in front this woman in search of dignity, this woman in struggle to survive. At least, I was moved. I love this series, from drama to crime through social elements.

Silliphant, working from a story by Ukrainian writer (of many a TV episode) Sam Ross, has fashioned an unusually poignant drama, virtually a one-woman show for the talents of unsung actress Betty Sinclair.

Introduced feeding birds in a snow-covered park in March in Manhattan, she gives a riveting performance of a down and out scrublady, spending her nights cleaning the floors of a Wall Street building and her spare time with her apartment full of cats. She furtively executes a bank robbery, pretending to hold a vial of nitroglycerine, with her note getting the teller to hand over a bag containing $2,000.

Witnesses give contradictory stories and the police are baffled but McMahon is particularly angry, noting that she will become a sort of folk hero for the daring act and encourage copycat robbers, no longer afraid of the severe consequences of the act.

Through the force of this Liverpool-born character actress (whose movie and TV credits are minor) we come to know a bleak life of desperation: she doesn't even have an ice box, just keeps the cats' milk cold outside on her window sill. The neighborhood chlldren mock her as a stereotyped cat lady, her co-workers hurl insults and a very well-written encounter with pawnbroker Ludwig Donath on East 14th Street wonderfully illustrates her futile attempt to hold on to a vestige of pride.

Story climaxes when she brings her chip on shoulder (and ton of resentment) attitude to her boss (the building superintendent), announcing "I quit" and is met with an almost tender object lesson in humility by the kindly guy, perfectly portrayed by Crahan Denton, an instantly recognizable but like Sinclair, an underappreciated character actor. The final scene of her with her cats is heartbreaking.

Director Stuart Rosenberg and writer Silliphant have created a memorable, near-perfect miniature drama, with no name talent on the guest cast list but a remarkable tribute to human dignity.