Stephen Schiff

“It's like a light-footed country dance in which three superb actresses show off their own versions of a single delicate step--the tight-rope jig between sanity and madness…. Beresford gives this milm a magnetic center--the radiance of three Mississippi sisters un-selfconsciously romping together … Sissy Spacek makes her majorette-gone-round-the-bend role at once cuddly and disturbing, and Jessica Lange--with … a vibrant air of Valkyrie authority--is even better . . . Best of all, though, is Diane Keaton, playing the ingrown family spinster. At first you think she'll never sustain it--the southern accent, the pinched homeliness, the lank hair and teetering walk, the layers and layers of oversize sweaters. But her performance builds into something terribly poignant--she's like a younger, subtler Geraldine Page, her seams unraveling, her voice escaping crazily into the ozone.”

Stephen Schiff
Vanity Fair, January 1987
[I’m not sure “subtler” is the word…]