What do you want? Watching this movie doesn't really provide a concrete answer.
Newly widowed Alice (Ellen Burstyn) has a pipe dream about being a singer back in her childhood hometown. She knows deep down that she doesn't have the talent anymore, but nonetheless, lacking even the money necessary to travel there, she sets off on a road trip back to Monterrey with her bratty 11 year old boy (Alfred Lutter).
Along the way, as she works odd jobs to finance the trip, she becomes involved with a psycho (Harvey Keitel) and a nice guy (Kristofferson). She flees from the psycho and almost flees from the nice guy too because he dares to discipline her out-of-control brat, which she steadfastly refuses to do. Finally when Kristofferson bends the knee and offers to pull up stakes and go with her to Monterrey, she seems happy to stay with him in Tucson.
Moral of the story? Who knows? Seems like Scorsese is just showing us a slice of life for a middle aged woman. That was probably something that hadn't been done much in the seventies.
Newly widowed Alice (Ellen Burstyn) has a pipe dream about being a singer back in her childhood hometown. She knows deep down that she doesn't have the talent anymore, but nonetheless, lacking even the money necessary to travel there, she sets off on a road trip back to Monterrey with her bratty 11 year old boy (Alfred Lutter).
Along the way, as she works odd jobs to finance the trip, she becomes involved with a psycho (Harvey Keitel) and a nice guy (Kristofferson). She flees from the psycho and almost flees from the nice guy too because he dares to discipline her out-of-control brat, which she steadfastly refuses to do. Finally when Kristofferson bends the knee and offers to pull up stakes and go with her to Monterrey, she seems happy to stay with him in Tucson.
Moral of the story? Who knows? Seems like Scorsese is just showing us a slice of life for a middle aged woman. That was probably something that hadn't been done much in the seventies.