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Interiors is a 1978 American drama film written and directed by Woody Allen. It stars Kristin Griffith, Mary Beth Hurt, Richard Jordan, Diane Keaton, E. G. Marshall, Geraldine Page, Maureen Stapleton, and Sam Waterston.
The film was released in the United States on August 2, 1978, by United Artists. Allen's first full-fledged film in the drama genre, it was met with acclaim from critics. It received five Academy Award nominations, including Best Director, Best Original Screenplay (both for Allen), Best Actress (Page), and Best Supporting Actress (Stapleton). Page also won the BAFTA Film Award for Best Supporting Actress.
One morning, Arthur unexpectedly announces that he wants a separation from his wife and would like to live alone. Eve, who is clinically depressed, attempts suicide in her new Manhattan apartment. The shock of these two events causes a rift among the sisters. Arthur returns from a trip to Greece with Pearl, a high-spirited and more "normal" woman, whom he intends to marry. His daughters are disturbed that Arthur would disregard Eve's suicide attempt and find another woman, to whom Joey refers as a "vulgarian".
Arthur and Pearl marry at the family's Long Island beach house, with Renata, Joey, and Flyn in attendance. Later in the evening, Joey lashes out at Pearl when Pearl accidentally breaks one of Eve's vases. In the middle of the night, Flyn inhales cocaine in the garage and Frederick drunkenly attempts to rape her, but she manages to escape. Meanwhile, Joey finds Eve in the house, and sadly explains how much she has given up for her mother, and how disdainfully she is treated. Eve walks out onto the beach and into the surf. Joey unsuccessfully attempts to save Eve, but nearly drowns in the process. Mike rescues Joey, pulling her to shore, so that Pearl resuscitates the drowned victim by tilting Joey's head back, clearing the airway, and pinching the nose, to administer rescue breaths into her lungs via mouth-to-mouth.
The family attends Eve's funeral, each placing a single white rose—Eve's favorite flower and a symbol of hope to her—on Eve's wooden coffin, after which the three sisters look out at the sea from their former family beach house and comment on the peacefulness of the sea.
Vincent Canby of The New York Times called the film "beautiful" and complimented Gordon Willis on his "use of cool colors that suggest civilization's precarious control of natural forces", but noted:
Richard Schickel of Time wrote that the film's "desperate sobriety ... robs it of energy and passion"; Allen's "style is Bergmanesque, but his material is Mankiewiczian, and the discontinuity is fatal. Doubtless this was a necessary movie for Allen, but it is both unnecessary and a minor embarrassment for his well-wishers."
Roger Ebert gave the film four stars and praised it highly, writing, "Here we have a Woody Allen film, and we're talking about O'Neill and Ingmar Bergman and traditions and influences? Yes, and correctly. Allen, whose comedies have been among the cheerful tonics of recent years, is astonishingly assured in his first drama."
Gene Siskel awarded three stars out of four and wrote:
Charles Champlin called the film "somber, intense and stunning", concluding, "Like Cries and Whispers, Allen's Interiors is, for all the somberness of the material, in the end an affirmation of life and a transcendent piece of art. The film lovers will love it if joke-seekers do not.
Penelope Gilliatt of The New Yorker wrote: "This droll piece of work is Allen's most majestic so far. The theme its characters express is very Anton Chekhov. It is pinned to the idea that the hardest, and most admirable thing to do is to act properly through a whole life."
James Monaco, in his 1979 book American Film Now, described Interiors as "the most pretentious film by a major American filmmaker in the last thirty years" alongside Mickey One (1965).
In 2016, Interiors was listed as Allen's 11th best film in an article by The Daily Telegraph critics Robbie Collin and Tim Robey, who wrote that "the emotional effort being expended is cumulatively hard to shrug off" and praised Stapleton's performance.
Later, while watching the film with an acquaintance, Allen reportedly said, "It's always been my fear. I think I'm writing Long Day's Journey into Night and it turns into Edge of Night."
Looking back on the film in 1982, Allen said:
| Best Actress | Geraldine Page | |
| Best Supporting Actress | Maureen Stapleton | |
| Best Screenplay – Written Directly for the Screen | Woody Allen | |
| Best Art Direction | Mel Bourne and Daniel Robert | |
| Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles | Mary Beth Hurt | |
| Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture | Maureen Stapleton | |
| Best Director – Motion Picture | Woody Allen | |
| Best Screenplay – Motion Picture | ||
| Best Director | Woody Allen | |
| Best Actress | Geraldine Page | |
| Best Supporting Actress | Geraldine Page | |
| Maureen Stapleton | ||
| Best Screenplay | Woody Allen | |
| Best Screenplay | Woody Allen | |
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