BEFORE: Let's pause for some blog math - I'm now 631 movies into this crazy project, with 368 movies still on the list (I started with 435, and I've been adding as well as subtracting). 631 + 368 = 999. Watching a nice round number of films like 1,000 in a row doesn't seem so impossible now. I've got 100 days left in the year, and if I watch 99 more films, I'll be on track. So maybe if I don't add too many more films to the list, I can get it down under 300 before Dec. 31, that would be a nice accomplishment.
THE PLOT: A drop-out from upper-class America picks up work along the way on oil-rigs when his life isn't spent in a squalid succession of bars, motels, and other points of interest.
AFTER: Dropping out and running away from society is a theme that carries over from last night's film, so in many ways this is a good follow-up to "Easy Rider".
On one level, this is about a man traveling back to his childhood home to visit his sick father, but it's also about a man's reactions to bad situations - like his dead-end construction jobs and failing marriage. Then there also the petty annoyances of everyday life - like traffic jams, and people who just won't shut up, and the boringness of visiting a small town, where there's nothing to do. The kind of things that make you want to just chuck it all, and go find yourself an island somewhere, with no one else around.
But you can only push a man so far, and this is why you get Nicholson - for his reactions. His diner freakout where he tells the strict waitress to "Hold the chicken salad..." is as quotable, for me anyway, as Brando's "I coulda been a contenda" speech.
There's something stunningly realistic about this film - I could certainly connect with it better than I could with two stoned hippies riding cross-country on motorcycles. Of course, my mother was a music teacher, and when I go back to visit, it always reminds me of things I never accomplished. People who haven't known me for long are sometimes shocked to learn that I have a background in music and theater.
As for the ending, hey, at least it HAS one that's motivated by the plot. And every ending is a new beginning, right?
Also starring Karen Black (carrying over from "Easy Rider"), Ralph Waite, Lois Smith (last seen in "Twister"), Fannie Flagg, Sally Struthers, and Toni Basil (also carrying over from "Easy Rider")
RATING: 5 out of 10 mobile homes
JACK-O-METER: 7 out of 10 - Really, how many times have you just wanted to tell a room full of pretentious people that they're all full of crap? Jack does that here, and more.
It's the opposite of "Easy Rider." I think it even exceeds "The Graduate," a movie which still has a _bit_ of a hippie stink to it. "Five Easy Pieces" treads much the same ground -- a survey of a man who doesn't want to do what his family and Society expect him to do -- but in a universal sense. It's relevant to any era.
ReplyDeleteSo: is this the JACK-oh-MEET-er, or is it the jack-AHHHH-meh-ter?
In my head anyway, it's the Jack-ahh-meter. Feels more like "Thermometer" and "Odometer" with the schwa sound.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if the film is the direct "opposite" of "Easy Rider" - because Nicholson's characters are somewhat similar. Privileged lawyer, privileged musician, who have both decided to remove themselves from family and society, and live by their own rules, regardless of the consequences involved - which then creates a new set of problems.
Maybe I'm looking for connections where there are none?