Five Easy Pieces
He Rode the Fast Lane on the Road to Nowhere.
In an Academy Award -nominated performance for Best Actor, Jack Nicholson is outstanding in Five Easy Pieces, the acclaimed drama from director Bob Rafelson. Although a brilliant, classical pianist from an intellectual, well-to-do family - Robert Dupea has made a career out of running from job to job and woman to woman. Presently working in an oil field, Dupea spends most of his free time downing beers,playing poker and being noncommittal with his sexy but witless girlfriend Rayette. But when he is summoned to his father's deathbed, Dupea returns home with Raette, where he meets and falls for a sophisticated woman. Now caught between his conflicting lifestyles, the gifted but troubled Dupea must face issues that will change his life forever. Deceptively simple, but one of the most complex and interesting films of its time - Five Easy Pieces garnered a 1970 Academy Award nomination for Best Picture - with Black receiving the 1970 New York Film Critics award for her excellent performance.
Member Reviews
Funny How One Scene Defines a Movie - PrinceofIdleness
Five Easy Pieces is about a privileged but restless young man with great talents and abilities who breaks from his family to go slumming in the oil fields of America. Along the way, he picks up a white trash girlfriend who is in every respect more moral than him but who also doesn't have the manners or benefits of class and wealth that he does.
The story is about a road trip: from the oil fields back home.
In retrospect, it's apparent to me that this movie was about class warfare in America. The fundamental dramatic tension between the Nicholson character and Karen Black's is that he's middle/upper class and she's not.
So it's funny that the scene everyone knows in this film - where Jack Nicholson's character battles verbally with a waitress to get the side of whole wheat toast he wants - is understood to be an emblem of the "little guy" fighting against the corporate rule of "no substitutions."
Absolutely that's not what the scene - or the film - is about. It's about how rich people in America react to the rules. Nicholson's character wants a choice off the menu, dammit, and his response when he doesn't get it is the rage he expresses throughout the film. He's a spoiled child of privilege prepared to burn every bridge and abandon every person who loves him because he's not getting what he wants - whatever that is.
And he was the new American hero in the early 1970's.
So this movie is worth seeing because of its portent of the future, and not because of its populist message - which it really doesn't have.Did not age well - RobBC
Jack Nicholson takes his job and shoves it in this rather overrated character study released at the beginning of the “ME” generation. There is some depth here with action taking place on more than one level. The spare soundtrack (Tammy Wynette and Chopin?!) is effective as is the use of music to add definition to the key characters....the “five easy pieces” of the title. The performances are impressive and the understated ending was perfect. Unfortunately, this is a film that belongs in 1970....a true period piece. Much of the initial impact it had 40 years ago has not withstood the test of time and even though I can appreciate what it said to a past generation I still found Nicholson’s character tedious and petty. It was one of the defining films of its decade however, and that alone is worth the rental fee.A Tormented Soul - Jimmy_Jam
Nicholas gives one of his earlist perfromances in which he seems to play himself, although this is much darker. There is a brooding wave of uncertainty surrounding his character, and you feel like he is going to explode. He did not take the path that was provided for him by his family. He is taking on the world by himself and losing. A fascinating human study that is never overdone.
Member Reviews
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Funny How One Scene Defines a Movie - PrinceofIdleness
Five Easy Pieces is about a privileged but restless young man with great talents and abilities who breaks from his family to go slumming in the oil fields of America. Along the way, he picks up a white trash girlfriend who is in every respect more moral than ...Did not age well - RobBC
Jack Nicholson takes his job and shoves it in this rather overrated character study released at the beginning of the “ME” generation. There is some depth here with action taking place on more than one level. The spare soundtrack (Tammy Wynette and Chopin?!) ...A Tormented Soul - Jimmy_Jam
Nicholas gives one of his earlist perfromances in which he seems to play himself, although this is much darker. There is a brooding wave of uncertainty surrounding his character, and you feel like he is going to explode. He did not take the path that was provided ...