3 Women

Set in a sun worn southwestern town, 3 Women follows two roommates whose contrasts drive a charged relationship. Mildred Millie Lammoreaux is stylish and self assured, always calculating how she appears to others. Pinky Rose is a shy, awkward young woman with an imaginative streak and a blunt, literal take on life. When they share a cramped home, ordinary chores and conversations take on a strange rhythm, and it's as if boundaries blur and strategies shift. Altman films their days with patient, almost ceremonial attention, turning small incidents into a stage where prestige, affection, and control slip from one woman to the other. The result is a bold meditation on female perception and influence that resists simple explanation or catharsis.

Directed by Robert Altman and released in 1977, 3 Women stems from ideas by Patricia Resnick. The film is noted for Altman's audacious ensemble approach and a lean budget around 1.5 million, typical of his experimental mid career work.

Since its debut, 3 Women has been celebrated for its dreamlike mood and feminist undercurrents, influencing indie cinema and critical discourse. Its fluid shifts in identity and power, paired with offbeat humor and long takes, helped redefine what a women centered drama could feel like for critics and scholars.

Critical response highlighted the film's unusual structure, patient pacing, and the mood that sits between satire and mysticism. It probes themes of identity, social facades, and female complicity, refusing tidy answers and inviting viewers to question how relationships shape who we become in a plural, shifting world.

Over time the film has not secured major nominations at the Oscars or Golden Globes, but it has earned lasting admiration from critics and scholars for its bold formal experiments and provocative portrayal of female dynamics. It has been recognized as a landmark within Altman's body of work.