Friday, January 23, 2009

Frost/Nixon


Little Opie Cunningham had lots to work with here. Nixon/Frost is a fascinating historical story, was well tuned as a London and Broadway play, and most of all, had two exceptional actors who had really developed their roles. Frank Langella will never be mentioned first as a guest star of villains for hour long cop films. He is probably the best actor's depiction of Richard Milhaus Nixon ever.

In the meantime, we get to be witness to all kinds of themes, situations and ideas. Frost/Nixon is a full meal deal. We explore one of the important moments in celebrity journalism. We see also that journalism can be equipped to move into realms that those of the courts are not able to go after Ford's pattern. We see the closest thing to a boxing match that you can have with out a gloves or a round card girls flashing their entitlements to all four sides of the ring.

But we do see cornermen. For President Nixon it is Jack Brennan, whose loyalty is portrayed by director Ron Howard and screenwriter Peter Morgan as being greater than that of Haldeman, Erichlichman, Mitchell, Colson, or Mitchell all rolled up together. It is a brilliant piercing performance and a great match for Frank Langella's Nixon, and Michael Sheen's David Frost.

For the Frost side, he was surrounded by energy of his assistant John Birt plus journalist/researchers Bob Zelnick and James Reston, Jr played by Oliver Platt and Sam Rockwell. I do not like Rockwell's style or acting. It is probably just a matter of taste, but I think he can't help but come off as a clone of Dana Carvey. I think that Choke would have been a far more interesting film without him and he kind of became a distract for me as Reston in this film. Still his part in this story was very important. I believe the lesson of this very strange little episode of history is summarized by Reston in the final speech of the film:

You know the first and greatest sin of the deception of television is that it simplifies; it diminishes great, complex ideas, trenches of time; whole careers become reduced to a single snapshot...I really understood the reductive power of the close-up, because David had succeeded on that final day, and getting for a fleeting moment what no investigative journalist, no state prosecutor, no judiciary committee or political enemy had managed to get; Richard Nixon's face swollen and ravaged by loneliness, self-loathing in defeat. The rest of the project and its failings would not only be forgotten, they would totally cease to exist.

posted by well-executed buffet at 2:23 PM
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