|
Alphabetic Index
|
Ratings Index
|
Web Resources
|
Alphabetic Index
|
Ratings Index
|
Web Resources
Life as an oil-rigger is a real humdrum existence, particularly when you don't know why you're doing it. Sometimes Bobby argues with the foreman or gets stinking drunk with Elton, which achieves the same effect as far as work's concerned. One time Bobby jumps onto the back of a truck, while they're grid- locked on the highway, and starts bashing away at the old piano strapped there. The truck drives away from Elton, with Bobby still playing tunes that nobody else will recognise - a brief flash of brilliance, a hint of what might have been. Another time Elton gets dragged away by the cops for holding up a gas station, just when Bobby has finds out that Ray is pregnant. Unready for commitment, this sort of pressure is just too much for Bobby to take, so he heads off for LA without a word.
In the busy metropolis Bobby, without really trying, tracks down his sister Partita (Lois Smith) in a recording studio. After an emotional reunion the, obviously fragile, Partita mentions that their father Nicholas (William Challee) has suffered a pair of debilitating strokes. An accidental and unwanted reminder for Bobby of his past. Although Bobby hasn't visited home for several years, now might be a good time because it may be the last chance to see his father. Even with this impetus Bobby is unhappy about trekking all the way up to Puget Sound, where he'll see his supercilious brother Carl Fidelio (Ralph Waite) again. Still Carl apparently has a bright, young student, Catherine Van Ost (Susan Anspach), who might prove interesting. However, Ray insists on tagging along to meet his family (a prospect he dreads - the meeting of dissimilar worlds). Then they pick up a pair of lesbian hitch-hikers and the trip gets really interesting!
Five Easy Pieces is an unusually easy movie to watch, partly because it's a fine piece of work and partly through its amazingly relaxed atmosphere. Without pressure stemming from a need to rush through to the script's conclusion, characters are able to come and go, to naturally inhabit the landscape of the picture. The other aspect of this deliberate pacing is that it reflects the personality of Bobby, a man for whom there will never by a definite ending, only a succession of vague plateaus. Strangely this makes Bobby a highly compelling person, someone to whom the normal laws of relationships fail to apply. He can get away with treating people like dirt and looking down on them even as he pretends to be working class, a facade which allows him to smother his unfocused anguish beneath a blanket of physical exhaustion and alcohol. He doesn't belong in the motel-living community but neither does he belong in the rarified atmosphere of Puget Sound - he really is a nowhere man.
Throughout the entire cast of Five Easy Pieces there are no examples of bad acting, miscasting or shallow characterisation. Whilst not everyone is able to plumb the depths of subtlety that Nicholson achieves, every role has a spark which brings it to life (even the non-functional Nicholas). Contrasting the two strata of society that Bobby bridges, the collision between soap-opera connoisseur and intellectual culture-vulture is embodied in Ray (when she arrives at the mansion). She is way out of depth with these high-brow artists, which graphically illustrates the gulf between Bobby and Ray, yet she retains her own dignity and sense of worth. The Dupea's have constructed an almost incestuous retreat, divorced from "reality" and explanation enough for Bobby's headlong plunge away. Ultimately Bobby is the victim, frustrated by a lack of direction and confused about his needs, a fate which Nicholson ambiguously shows.
Relying on a sophisticated, perceptive script, Five Easy Pieces is a timeless reflection of America and its love/hate relationship with the establishment. In a single, brief scene (involving toast and a recalcitrant waitress), a lifetime of frustration for Bobby is distilled into a sweep of the arm. Backed up by the cinematography of Laszlo Kovacs, Five Easy Pieces says much about the inevitability of life without seeming to. It's a cunning technique which seems entirely appropriate to a film made in the 70s, yet doesn't result in it being out of date 25 years later. A nervy classic.
|
Alphabetic Index
|
Ratings Index
|
Web Resources