[...] The insuperable obstacle was that the contract with Columbia stipulated a maximum 140-minute running time. To achieve it, Cassavetes ultimately had to make enormous block cuts. It was extremely hard for him to make them. At the time, he said ‘the cuts caused me real physical pain, because I loved the scenes so much’. (The reason he compressed the credits onto two title cards in the release print was in a desperate attempt to save every possible second of actual film.) Years later, Cassavetes expressed regret that he had not torn up the contract and gone with the long version.