A derelict mother with hostility issues raises two radically different daughters in a hovel. Based on a Pulitzer prize winning play this story is pure fiction and could have only crept out of the mind of some couch potato writer who had a dismal outlook on single- parent upbringings. One of the daughters is a wise-cracking, boy- crazy socialite who deals with her mother's heavy handed tirades by modeling her own mother's behavior against her. Oh, and she happens to be an epileptic prone to grand maul seizures. The other, a shy and delicate girl with sweet and refined manners who escapes her depressing home life through an interest in her High School science projects. Woodward puts her all into the performance, yet is still too refined to plausibly portray a degenerate hag who chain smokes, drinks malt liquor and spews out witty and sarcastic barbs. Her vocal manner doesn't quite jibe with the nature of the character and it comes off as a bit too stagy. The family lives in squalor while the mother scrounges a measly living selling scam vacations from her dingy living room chair. No surprise comes when she senses she's losing her prospect's interest that she lashes out with insulting quips to exact revenge for her life filled with rejection and abandonment. The early 70's brought us movies that focused more on character interaction where the underlying intention was to make the audience feel uncomfortable and enthralled at the same time. Marigolds serve as a metaphor in which radioactive relationships can have either vexing effects on their victims or they can yield strangely beautiful results depending on the frequency. One peculiar and offensive aspect of the film is where we witness a case of elder abuse in which a woman drops off her elderly mother as a lodger in the dysfunctional family's slattern home. This is not an enjoyable film and I found some of the scenes repugnant, but it is certainly a thinking person's movie for those who are drawn to corrosive drama, people with bad character traits and folks who are simply down and out have-nots of the world.