"Something Like a Confessional Manifesto from the Emerging Director"

"All the talk in 'Too Late Blues' of integrity and authenticity seems even more significant in light of the career Cassavetes went on to forge. Despite a certain mannered slickness, the film is proof of his inability, even under clear constraints, to make anything less than a deeply personal work."

Dennis Lim in the Los Angeles Times revisits John Cassavetes's 1962 movie, Too Late Blues.

"The Film You Have Just Seen Is an Improvisation"

"Cassavetes' movie not only anticipated Mean Streets, Stranger Than Paradise, She's Gotta Have It, and Slacker, among countless others—it helped will them into being. As Martin Scorsese noted, after Shadows, there were 'no more excuses' for aspiring filmmakers: 'If he could do it, so could we!' And yet 50 years after its release, Shadows is a forgotten movie, revered by cultists, critics, and historians but neglected by a culture on which it has had a profound influence."

Elbert Ventura asserts in Slate that John Cassavetes invented modern independent film fifty years ago today.