Jack Nicholson

not sure yet what im votin tho

― johnny crunch, Friday, 20 March 2009 23:56 (4 years ago) Permalink

Five Easy Pieces

― kenan, Friday, 20 March 2009 23:56 (4 years ago) Permalink

Five Easy Pieces through Cuckoo's Nest is one helluva string.

Voted for Chinatown.

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 20 March 2009 23:57 (4 years ago) Permalink

Wow I forgot what an amazing career he had before he went completely off the rails.

― Alex in SF, Friday, 20 March 2009 23:57 (4 years ago) Permalink

I AM THE MOTHERFUCKING SHORE PATROL!

― Blackout Crew are the Beatles of donk (jim), Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:00 (4 years ago) Permalink

"Chinatown" seems the obvious choice to me?

― Pashmina, Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:00 (4 years ago) Permalink

voted chinatown with a nod to as good as it gets tbh

― 14 karat gold steen computer wizard (BIG HOOS aka the steendriver), Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:07 (4 years ago) Permalink

voted 5 easy pieces out of instinct but admittedly I haven't seen the more obscure stuff

― iatee, Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:10 (4 years ago) Permalink

chinatown 4-ever

― i stole a metal dude's t-shirt in richmond just to watch him cry (latebloomer), Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:32 (4 years ago) Permalink

The Last Detail.

― Mark G, Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:36 (4 years ago) Permalink

So, was the "Little Shop of Horrors" too obscure for the poll?

― Mark G, Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:37 (4 years ago) Permalink

He's made so many movies that he deserves his own Most Underrated Jack Nicholson Movie poll.

For example:

The Passenger
King of Marvin Gardens
The Border (one of his best quiet performances)
The Pledge (ditto)

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:39 (4 years ago) Permalink

xp no, just had to cut it to 50

― johnny crunch, Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:43 (4 years ago) Permalink

he's really good in 'the two jakes', which is a totally enjoyable movie with an even better harvey keitel performance. only mentioning it because it's underrated. i'd vote 'the last detail'.

― The Prices are .......... VERY AFFORDABLE!!! (omar little), Saturday, 21 March 2009 00:44 (4 years ago) Permalink

xp fair enough

― Mark G, Saturday, 21 March 2009 01:00 (4 years ago) Permalink

Chinatown ahead of 10-12 other great performances

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 21 March 2009 02:00 (4 years ago) Permalink

i can't stand the counterculture movies he was in.

voted the pledge.

― abanana, Saturday, 21 March 2009 03:29 (4 years ago) Permalink

its Chinatown

― Roberto Mussolini (Shakey Mo Collier), Saturday, 21 March 2009 03:46 (4 years ago) Permalink

"xp no, just had to cut it to 50"

I understand that, but some of what you left he has fairly minor roles in.

― Alex in SF, Saturday, 21 March 2009 04:41 (4 years ago) Permalink

I remember really liking the two Hellman Westerns (only one of which is on the Poll). Suspect I'll vote Five Easy Pieces.

― Alex in SF, Saturday, 21 March 2009 04:43 (4 years ago) Permalink

Carnal Knowledge is a movie destroyed by laughable casting.

― Alex in SF, Saturday, 21 March 2009 04:44 (4 years ago) Permalink

Post-85 the hits become fewer and farther between, don't they?

― Alex in SF, Saturday, 21 March 2009 04:45 (4 years ago) Permalink

chinatown

― the name's ban. suggest ban (J0rdan S.), Saturday, 21 March 2009 04:48 (4 years ago) Permalink

i recently saw Terms of Endearment and his part was much smaller than i'd expected it to be.

nobody said Shining yet. he's funny there. :) also, a nod to About Schmidt.

― Ludo, Saturday, 21 March 2009 12:31 (4 years ago) Permalink

wtf, Ann-Margret is great in CK.

that's the problem w/ The Shining, too funny

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 21 March 2009 12:42 (4 years ago) Permalink

Sure, his more more nuanced performances are perhaps worthy of merit badges and such, but cmon, the correct answer is so obviously The Shining.

Tho this gets an honorable mention:

― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Saturday, 21 March 2009 14:03 (4 years ago) Permalink

"wtf, Ann-Margret is great in CK."

I don't remember Ann-Margret. Jack and Candace and Art are the laughably cast ones! They're all pushing 40 and pretending to play college students!

― Alex in SF, Saturday, 21 March 2009 14:05 (4 years ago) Permalink

His Terms of Endearment part is small, but he's so great in it!! But yeah, damn, this is really hard.

― lolling through my bagel (Pancakes Hackman), Saturday, 21 March 2009 14:20 (4 years ago) Permalink

the shining = jack nicholson as Godfather 2 = Al Pacino in terms of where self-parody began...

― JtM Is Ruled By A Black Man (Jimmy The Mod Awaits The Return Of His Beloved), Saturday, 21 March 2009 14:38 (4 years ago) Permalink

But Pacino doesn't yell much in GF2! The self-parody begins with Scarface, and maybe those other early eighties performances in films no one has much seen.

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 21 March 2009 14:52 (4 years ago) Permalink

Jack was 33 or 34 at time of CK, his hairline was just receding... when you have characters aging from 21 to 45 in a film, you have to pick an age, and hope your audience can suspend some belief. That's like ppl complaining about Stewart and Wayne being too old in Liberty Valance -- bullshit.

Also, A-M doesn't appear til after the college sequence in Carnal Knowledge.

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 21 March 2009 14:57 (4 years ago) Permalink

Jack's self-parody began w/ Cuckoo's Nest. But he does takes breaks from it, as in The Border and The Pledge.

Also, he's even funnier in Mars Attacks than Pacino is in Dick Tracy.

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:01 (4 years ago) Permalink

But Pacino doesn't yell much in GF2! The self-parody begins with Scarface, and maybe those other early eighties performances in films no one has much seen.

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, March 21, 2009 10:52 AM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^ Watch the "In my BEDROOM" sequence and get back to me.

― JtM Is Ruled By A Black Man (Jimmy The Mod Awaits The Return Of His Beloved), Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:02 (4 years ago) Permalink

"Jack was 33 or 34 at time of CK, his hairline was just receding"

He's an old looking 33. They should have cast someone in their early to mid-twenties and aged him for 41 sequences (which are a smaller part of the movie anyway.)

― Alex in SF, Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:25 (4 years ago) Permalink

I couldn't suspend disbelief. I found it incredibly distracting.

― Alex in SF, Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:26 (4 years ago) Permalink

pity then. CK w/ Ryan O'Neal, DNW.

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:30 (4 years ago) Permalink

^^^ Watch the "In my BEDROOM" sequence and get back to me.

I don't know -- I guess! But that's like arguing that the scene in Sophie's Choice where Streep has to choose b/w her kids sewed the seeds for self-parody.

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:32 (4 years ago) Permalink

it's weird to realize that i saw 4 of his last 7 movies in the theater - wtf is wrong with me

― dom sued (some dude), Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:38 (4 years ago) Permalink

the pledge is great, it was on tv the other day

― rip dom passantino 3/5/09 never forget (max), Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:47 (4 years ago) Permalink

I don't know -- I guess! But that's like arguing that the scene in Sophie's Choice where Streep has to choose b/w her kids sewed the seeds for self-parody.

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, March 21, 2009 11:32 AM (18 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban

It did!

― JtM Is Ruled By A Black Man (Jimmy The Mod Awaits The Return Of His Beloved), Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:52 (4 years ago) Permalink

Looking over this list, I account The Shining as the film that ruined Nicholson's career as an actor. It taught him how easy it was to ham it up and persuade audiences to accept it as good acting. He never looked back. Boy howdy, has he been gawdawful the past couple of decades!

btw, I voted Missouri Breaks, just to be contrarian. Chinatown is clearly the strongest horse in this field.

btw, I'm white.

― Aimless, Saturday, 21 March 2009 16:56 (4 years ago) Permalink

yelling in GF2 (or Panic in Needle Park) is not same as Robot Pacino Yelling

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 21 March 2009 18:10 (4 years ago) Permalink

voted easy rider because it's my favorite movie up there, but chinatown will (and prob should) win

― k3vin k., Saturday, 21 March 2009 18:15 (4 years ago) Permalink

I account The Shining as the film that ruined Nicholson's career as an actor. - I see your point, but just because TS birthed the "crazy Jack is gonna snap" schtick that, yeah, got old really quick, doesn't mean that his performance in that film, taken on its own, should be held accountable for The Witches of Eastwick or whatever. To use the Pacino analogy,Glengarry Glen Ross should not be blamed for The Devil's Advocate, even though his lawyer/Satan was essentially a hyper-stylized Ricky Roma.

I'm probably biased, being a horror buff, but I've always thought of the Jack Torrence character as one of cinema's great psychopaths, not necessarily for the cackling and clowning of the film's final third, but for the sinister undertone boiling up between the point when he hurts his son & later starts interacting with ghosts/hallucinations, hitting full stride in the uber-creepy dialog between Jack and the previous caretaker in the washroom. The "here's Johnny" sequence is what people typically associate with the character, but it is that bathroom exchange which best exemplifies the strength of his performance.

Sorry for the lengthy post. I just like The Shining a lot, flawed though it may be.

― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Saturday, 21 March 2009 19:16 (4 years ago) Permalink

Sorry for the lengthy post. I just like The Shining a lot, flawed though it may be.

i just watched Louis Theroux in some kind of self-help-hypnosis world and have to say: DON'T APOLOGIZE. that was a good post :)

― Ludo, Saturday, 21 March 2009 20:52 (4 years ago) Permalink

i'm not a good judge of what makes quality acting, but the movie of these i have enjoyed the most is prob. five easy pieces.

― ian, Saturday, 21 March 2009 21:19 (4 years ago) Permalink

xpost: thanks. I feel a little self-conscious when I'm the only dude on a thread with a long post, which tends to be often, just cuz I'm such a flowery bastard. I wasn't apologizing for my love of TS, but it is a flawed film. The third act just can't support the masterful tone of the first two (but at least it didn't end with an attack of giant hedge bunnies, as King would have preferred).

At first, while voting in polls, I was conflicted about whether I should vote for the objectively "best" thing, or the thing I just happen to like the most. In keeping with the (variably)anti-canonical spirit of ILX, I decided to just go with the latter. So yeah, objectively, Chinatown 9 times out of 10, but I'm voting for the first two-thirds of The Shinning (sic)

― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Saturday, 21 March 2009 21:47 (4 years ago) Permalink

i want you to hold this poll between your knees

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 21 March 2009 21:54 (4 years ago) Permalink

oh yeah, well I won't stand for your smartness and sarcasm.

― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Saturday, 21 March 2009 22:07 (4 years ago) Permalink

can you read THIS sign???

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 21 March 2009 22:22 (4 years ago) Permalink

has anyone here seen Woooooooolf? it's pretty great.

― droling lapdogs (hmmmm), Saturday, 21 March 2009 22:47 (4 years ago) Permalink

i voted the shining in spite of the hamminess; it's just such an indelible movie for me. i could have easily voted for any of his other classic roles.

― battlestar elastica (get bent), Saturday, 21 March 2009 22:52 (4 years ago) Permalink

i'd love to have a film festival of some of those lesser-known/underrated nicholson movies. i've never seen marvin gardens.

― battlestar elastica (get bent), Saturday, 21 March 2009 22:54 (4 years ago) Permalink

Anyone wanna make an argument for The Trip?

― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Saturday, 21 March 2009 23:14 (4 years ago) Permalink

Actually, I think he directed that one. I can't remember if he appeared in it or not.

― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Saturday, 21 March 2009 23:20 (4 years ago) Permalink

The Pledge is a fantastic novel (I got the Penguin w/Jack Nicholson's face on the cover). Glad to see the film is rated well by some here!

― xyzzzz__, Saturday, 21 March 2009 23:24 (4 years ago) Permalink

He was good in these films that I did not dig:

Carnal Knowledge (1971)
Terms Of Endearment (1983)
Hoffa (1992)
The Departed (2006)

He could do nothing to make me watch these films again:

The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981)
The Witches Of Eastwick (1987)
Batman (1989)
Anger Management (2003)
About Schmidt (2003)

― Pete Scholtes, Sunday, 22 March 2009 18:14 (4 years ago) Permalink

Chinatown easy. The Pledge is good.

― chap, Sunday, 22 March 2009 18:18 (4 years ago) Permalink

Remake of Postman is awful.

― Alex in SF, Sunday, 22 March 2009 18:32 (4 years ago) Permalink

gotta be the passenger for me. one of my favorite movies.

― ryan, Sunday, 22 March 2009 18:50 (4 years ago) Permalink

The Witches of Eastwick is fun -- my favorite of his hambone performances.

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 22 March 2009 19:21 (4 years ago) Permalink

I'm going for Chinatown on this one, definitely. Has there ever been a thread on favourite director cameos? I adore Polanski in this.

Anyone wanna make an argument for The Trip?

I enjoyed that film a lot, but I don't think Nicholson was in it as an actor. Saw it too long ago to make a proper argument for it as a good film, but it was definitely fun.

― emil.y, Sunday, 22 March 2009 19:59 (4 years ago) Permalink

the trip is the russ meyer one w/ peter fonda right? saw it recently...no jack. think he (co?)wrote it

― johnny crunch, Sunday, 22 March 2009 20:02 (4 years ago) Permalink

Yeah, it was Peter Fonda. Corman was the director, not sure if Meyer had anything to do with it. It's kind of Meyer-esque in places, I guess.

― emil.y, Sunday, 22 March 2009 20:21 (4 years ago) Permalink

Yeah, I just checked on IMDB & Nicholson wrote it. I'm not sure why I associated him so closely with the film. Was he in another, similar, film about the LSD experience?

― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Monday, 23 March 2009 00:57 (4 years ago) Permalink

Psych-Out? Or even Easy Rider?!

― emil.y, Monday, 23 March 2009 01:04 (4 years ago) Permalink

vote for easy rider so i'm not the only one

― abe being busy (k3vin k.), Monday, 23 March 2009 01:41 (4 years ago) Permalink

i prefer Wolf to The Shining and Blood & Wine and Batman to The Departed.

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Monday, 23 March 2009 01:45 (4 years ago) Permalink

xxpost: Sure, ES is pretty psychedelic, but I'm thinking of something where the depiction of the "trip" is the central premise. I'm guessing Psych-Out is the one I'm (not really) remembering or, at least, so the title would indicate.

― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Monday, 23 March 2009 01:47 (4 years ago) Permalink

Also wrote Head, the Monkees movie, but not in it so far as I remember...

― Pete Scholtes, Monday, 23 March 2009 02:29 (4 years ago) Permalink

he is, for 5-10 seconds.

Poll also doesnt have the film where he played Peter Lorre's son.

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Monday, 23 March 2009 02:34 (4 years ago) Permalink

I don't know anyone in charge of making movies, but I wish they would start making more movies like Hells Angels on Wheels.

Get on a motorcycle
Go to carnival
Get drunk and stoned
Paint Naked Women
repeat then have fight that goes wrong...

That is a movie. The end is pretty classic as Nicholson has a total 'what the hell just happened' look on his face.

― earlnash, Monday, 23 March 2009 05:52 (4 years ago) Permalink

Voted for The Passenger... Tremendous movie and gets overlooked a lot. The Shooting is my #2 pick

― Chris Barrus (Elvis Telecom), Monday, 23 March 2009 07:07 (4 years ago) Permalink

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

― System, Saturday, 28 March 2009 00:01 (4 years ago) Permalink

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

― System, Sunday, 29 March 2009 00:01 (4 years ago) Permalink

Ironweed got a vote?!

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 29 March 2009 00:05 (4 years ago) Permalink

far less scandalous than motherfucking Shining -- quintessential bad Jack, save for red bathroom scene.

― Past a Diving Jeter (Dr Morbius), Sunday, 29 March 2009 07:12 (4 years ago) Permalink

aw come on it's a great, funny flick.

― Henry Frog (Frogman Henry), Sunday, 29 March 2009 11:24 (4 years ago) Permalink

hmm, i just watched carnal knowledge. great film.

― Yellow Carded (titchyschneiderMk2), Sunday, 29 March 2009 12:20 (4 years ago) Permalink

I saw it while ago, I hadn't even heard about such a film before, and was pleasantly surprised. Great performance by Nicholson as a smug bastard. I think it's quite rare to see Hollywood films where none of the protagonists are really sympathetic at all. (Though did feel sorry for Ann-Margret's character.)

― Tuomas, Sunday, 29 March 2009 13:16 (4 years ago) Permalink

Strikes me as one of those culturally necessary films after the kind of Mad Men era, and I love Ann-Margaret so it was sort of both compulsory and painful viewing. But like a lot of films from that time, it's just so clearly WRITTEN but without the joys of good writing--the worst of naturalism and mannerism, if that makes sense. I just watched The King of Marvin Gardens and had a slightly similar reaction, again with great performances in a game that seems both dreary and rigged. Nice study of classic '70s-film atmosphere though.

― Pete Scholtes, Sunday, 29 March 2009 15:25 (4 years ago) Permalink

Agreed. Ellen Burstyn gives the best performance in KOMG anyway.

― The Screaming Lobster of Challops (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 29 March 2009 15:29 (4 years ago) Permalink

I don't think I saw this poll, but Prizzi's Honor deserved a vote. Too bad it was misspelled.

― Zero Transfats Waller (Oilyrags), Sunday, 29 March 2009 22:44 (4 years ago) Permalink

poor easy rider

― pfunkboy (Herman G. Neuname), Sunday, 29 March 2009 23:15 (4 years ago) Permalink

Nothing for Batman :(

― billstevejim, Monday, 30 March 2009 07:24 (4 years ago) Permalink

missed this, would have gone Shining.

yeah null points for batman, bit surprised

― Ant Attack.. (Ste), Monday, 30 March 2009 08:51 (4 years ago) Permalink

Really good in Hoffa, which, I was surprised to remember, had some good bits.

― Bud Huxtable (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 22 May 2009 23:46 (4 years ago) Permalink

Hoffa's pretty ridiculous, but mostly enjoyable - devito's the best dude in that movie though

i think i would've voted for The Border

― ℳℴℯ　❤＼(◕‿◕✿ (Princess TamTam), Saturday, 26 February 2011 13:34 (2 years ago) Permalink

75 today. Sad scene.

― clemenza, Sunday, 22 April 2012 12:56 (1 year ago) Permalink

http://life.time.com/culture/jack-nicholson-unpublished-photos-1969/?iid=lf%7Clatest#1

― World Congress of Itch (Dr Morbius), Monday, 23 April 2012 11:37 (1 year ago) Permalink

watched both the border & the passenger today -- similar disconnected vibe in both, but hes consistently compelling to watch in p much every scene of each, think i actually preferred the border a little

― johnny crunch, Saturday, 4 May 2013 23:30 (1 month ago) Permalink

the border's really good.

a few good men was on tv the other day so i watched it, jack's great in the 'i eat breakfast' scene. horrible score

― turds (Hungry4Ass), Sunday, 5 May 2013 00:09 (1 month ago) Permalink

it's nicely subtle in that nicholsons character isnt the boy scout cop caricature outraged @ his corrupt colleagues &/or w/ a crusading woody for mistreated brown ppl but more i think that he just realizes that even going along w/ it, getting $ & w/e would only mean his wife would buy more worthless furniture & whatnot so y not do the "right" thing~

― johnny crunch, Sunday, 5 May 2013 01:09 (1 month ago) Permalink

otm

― Ask The Answer Man (sexyDancer), Sunday, 5 May 2013 04:34 (1 month ago) Permalink

don't think I've seen it since '82 so it's time I spose

― Pope Rusty I (Dr Morbius), Sunday, 5 May 2013 13:56 (1 month ago) Permalink

his best from that dark post-Cuckoo's Nest pre-Reds period.

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 May 2013 14:04 (1 month ago) Permalink

Just to be thoroughly annoying, The Border came out after Reds...I've never seen it (meant to at the time); better than The Shining?

― clemenza, Sunday, 5 May 2013 14:07 (1 month ago) Permalink

You're right!

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 May 2013 14:09 (1 month ago) Permalink

His performance? Yeah. Whether the movie is better than The Shining I'll leave for the Kubrickiphiliacs.

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 May 2013 14:10 (1 month ago) Permalink

I think you know my answer....

Does anyone like Goin' South? Never saw that one. In an alternate reality he could've been a comedic stalwart, as in The Fortune (or the Little Shop cameo).

― Pope Rusty I (Dr Morbius), Sunday, 5 May 2013 14:28 (1 month ago) Permalink

I walked out on The Border after the first 50 minutes or so, ages ago, when I saw it in a theater back when it was released. I don't recall Nicholson's performance as being the main problem so much as the script and direction. I felt I was being intensely manipulated and I didn't like it. Still, it makes me wonder at all the favorable remarks that film gets on this thread. I couldn't stand it.

― Aimless, Sunday, 5 May 2013 20:36 (1 month ago) Permalink

well it's been 21 years, Aim.

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 May 2013 20:36 (1 month ago) Permalink

incidentally his commentary track for The Passenger, which I praised here years ago, is still one of my favorites -- one of the few actors who understood exactly what the director wanted him to do as well as having perfect insight into the director's methods, period.

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 May 2013 20:38 (1 month ago) Permalink

in the as good as it gets commentary nicholson doesn't say much for a while and then there's a shot out a window of some boats and he makes a HRMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM foghorn noise. best part of as good as it gets, obviously.

― the white queen and her caustic judgments (difficult listening hour), Sunday, 5 May 2013 20:46 (1 month ago) Permalink

xps hated goin' south so much! not just an early showcase for all his worst tendencies as an actor, but just excruciatingly unfunny & irritating. I mean I don't really rate his comedy performance in the shining either, but he does at least make me lol in that.

― just dude intonation (wins), Sunday, 5 May 2013 20:47 (1 month ago) Permalink

in the as good as it gets commentary nicholson doesn't say much for a while and then there's a shot out a window of some boats and he makes a HRMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM foghorn noise. best part of as good as it gets, obviously.

― the white queen and her caustic judgments (difficult listening hour), Sunday, May 5, 2013 4:46 PM (33 seconds ago) Bookmark

lmao

― turds (Hungry4Ass), Sunday, 5 May 2013 20:47 (1 month ago) Permalink

Looking over his filmography, I don't see Reds as any kind of demarcation point the way Alfred does. The point at which he starts imitating himself--sometime slyly, sometimes clunkily--and his films don't seem like such a big deal anymore, that seems to come a few years later. I'm not sure exactly when--I haven't seen everything in question--but maybe sometime in the mid/late-'80s? I would agree that Cuckoo's Nest ends his great period.

― clemenza, Sunday, 5 May 2013 20:54 (1 month ago) Permalink

The point at which he starts imitating himself is Cuckoo's Nest. Though he doesn't always.

― Pope Rusty I (Dr Morbius), Sunday, 5 May 2013 21:10 (1 month ago) Permalink

Gotta disagree there. Every actor has mannerisms--he's already doing Jack stuff in Easy Rider--but McMurphy is a fully realized character.

― clemenza, Sunday, 5 May 2013 21:26 (1 month ago) Permalink

I only mentioned Reds as his first Academy-recognized Good Performance since Cuckoo's Nest, and for once the Academy is right: that 1976-1982 period is dismal.

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 May 2013 21:38 (1 month ago) Permalink

*mentioned Reds BECAUSE it was

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 May 2013 21:38 (1 month ago) Permalink

he was awful and miscast in The Postman Always Rings Twice and - well, I won't say much about The Shining.

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 May 2013 21:39 (1 month ago) Permalink

agreed on postman, from that post-cuckoo pre-reds period i am very fond of the missouri breaks.

― balls, Sunday, 5 May 2013 23:06 (1 month ago) Permalink