The Nicholson Phenomenon

[dave durbin]

The glorification of a celebrity's star persona is one of the more disturbing and depressing characteristics of our society; when the critics and the public unite and honor the star for a limp achievement like 'About Schmidt', it's like a giant red flag for why our culture needs change; it's something that's almost never welcomed or accepted or even easy to admit.


Nicholson was undoubtedly one of our finest actors and gave performances in the early to mid-seventies (Five Easy Pieces, Carnal Knowledge, The Last Detail, Chinatown) that rank along side the best work of artists like Chaplin, Olivier, and Brando. Even when his acting was mediocre and the films were less than perfect (The Fortune, The Last Tycoon, Goin' South, The Missouri Breaks) he showed -and continues to show- an impressive list of directors and films that help define his great talent. But somewhere after he won his second Academy Award (for Terms of Endearment ironically) he became 'Jack'. Even with a weak Brooklyn accent (Prizzi's Honor) or a hobo's garb (Ironweed) or white pancake make-up (Batman) or turning in an absolutely hideous performance that proves he's weak as a character actor (Mars Attacks), he's always 'Jack'. He still has an eye for strong directors and projects that make him look good -it's no surprise he's in an upcoming Adam Sandler comedy (!)- but he's always 'Jack'. It was a wave that rose to a crescendo with his work in As Good As It Gets and climaxed when Madonna ripped open the Golden Globe envelope and announced the winner of the Best Actor in a Drama: she just simply smirked, looked out into the audience, and said "Jack." It didn't matter that he strolled through that role on star charisma alone, oh no, he won his third Oscar and had the entire Hollywood community and a bandwagon of critics at his feet. And now it's happening again with About Schmidt.

Why?

Just for the record, Gene Hackman's work is by far more consistantly superb (and he doesn't appear stoned out of his mind at every awards show), Nick Nolte -prior to the ecstacy bust- keeps getting better, Pacino may have his eye-rolling moments but he still retains a small flicker of greatness; but most importantly, they're all better character actors! And there are far more interesting young actors like Philip Seymour Hoffman, Johnny Depp, Steve Buscemi, Sean Penn, maybe Ed Norton or Jude Law, Billy Bob Thorton, or even Tony Shalhoub and Stanley Tucci. (I gave up long ago on DeNiro and Dustin Hoffman or they would be mentioned somewhere around here.)

The film itself is a grueling and grisly disappointment chock full of stereotypes (Warren's future son-in-law, Kathy Bates's character's family, etc.)and painfully labored comic set pieces: Warren's reaction to painkillers is an old cheap gag used in everything from Best Friends with Goldie Hawn to a Seinfeld episode with Julia Louise Dreyfus and his struggle on a waterbed is an even older, cheaper gag used in every trashy sitcom like Love American Style or Three's Company. The film's sledgehammer sublety is at its worst when the camera slowly moves into the end of a vacuum cleaner after Warren's discovers his wife on the floor (get it?) and when he makes his first stop in a small town, the film's message is displayed like a headline as the title of the movie showing at the local theater: Kill to Live. I didn't find About Schmidt to be as dull and slow moving like other viewers but it's an obvious piece of filmmaking and a perfect representation of what would have happened if Brett Ratner had directed Wild Strawberries. For the record, a man's self discovery and struggle with spiritual emptiness and regret caused from living the hollow corporate lifestyle was handled with much more insight, pathos, and humanity in 13 Conversations About One Thing with Alan Arkin, who gave a superb performance that's hardly even been acknowledged by any critics circle!

Warren's final moment is talked about as if Nicholson had achieved some sort of extraordinarily new height in the art of acting when actually he pulls the old actor's trick that's been used for applause and awards for years: he cries for us. Kathy Bates's inspiring bravado in her nude scene is the only sign of life in this Republican 'A Trip to Bountiful'.

Alexander Payne showed great film editing rhythyms, a tremendous sense of humor, and a wonderful observational style with Citizen Ruth and Election but his smug direction lacks the strong humanity and magic touch of Robert Altman (Nashville, McCabe & Mrs. Miller, The Long Goodbye), Paul Mazursky (Harry & Tonto, Next Stop Greenwich Village, Enemies, A Love Story), Hal Ashby (The Last Detail, Harold & Maude, Shampoo), Johnathan Demme (Melvin & Howard, Handle with Care, Something Wild) and Bob Rafelson (Five Easy Pieces, King of Marvin Gardens, Stay Hungry). Yet About Schmidt has bewitched almost the whole east and west coast critical community. This one-man's-journey-to-find-himself is a classist, almost condescending view of middle America - a place I'm sure no New York film critic has ever seen; a narrow minded generalization I take full pride in writing- that fails as both a satiric social commentary and an insightful character study. As for Nicholson, he's in and out of character in almost every other scene and his mugging is shameless. (When he doesn't play towards the camera he's fine but when he does he's like a hammy theater actor who doesn't know when to quit.)

This film may be the critics darling at the moment and is already considered a modern classic by some but maybe one day its cracks will be more visible to those who are able to step back and take an objective view of 'Jack'.




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------