AFFLICTION (1997)
A Film Review by Ted Prigge
Copyright 1999 Ted Prigge
Director: Paul Schrader
Writer: Paul Schrader (based on the novel by Russell Banks)
Starring: Nick Nolte, Sissy Spacek, James Coburn, Willem Dafoe, Brigid Tierney, Jim True, Holmes Osborn, Mary Beth Hurt, Marian Seldes, Sean McCann, Wayne Robson
It's easy to see some of the more prominent themes that hover over every single Paul Schrader script (or film): that of a man, seen as strong by others, is in fact crippled by a paralyzing pyschological handicap. In his most famous (and best) script, "Taxi Driver," Travis Bickle is a man haunted not only by Vietnam and maybe a bad childhood (both alluded to but never dealt with up front), but also by his present inadequacy to assimilate with society. In "Raging Bull" (co-written with Mardik Martin), Jake LaMotta is a powerful boxer who's plagued with jealousy and petty sexual anxiety. Even in "The Last Temptation of Christ," he shows Jesus as a man with a giant burden on his back, supposed to be some kind of reluctant martyr. "Affliction," his newest written AND directed film (others include "American Gigolo," "Mishima," and "Light Sleeper"), Schrader presents us with a man named Wade Whitehouse, a divorced, alcoholic small-town cop. Nick Nolte, usually a symbol of strong masculinity, plays Wade as a man beaten down by life, incredibly weary, and foolishly optimistic about the future.
In the film's first scene, Wade drives his estranged young daughter Jill (Brigid Tierney) to a halloween party in his town, and though she clearly doesn't want to go, Wade ignores it and assures her she'll have a good time. After abandoning her with people she doesn't even know, he goes out for a quick smoke, and when he comes back in he finds that she's called her mother (Mary Beth Hurt) and asked her to come pick her up. This scene is masterful for several reasons: a) it easily sets up the characters, not by telling about their past lives, but by demonstrating it through human action; b) it has no real direction, and feels to flow like an improvistational section of life; and c) it sets the stage for what's to come.
There are two intertwining stories going on here, and the first one begins shortly after, concerning a hunting accident where a notoriously wealthy man (Sean McCann) was shot to death in the presence of Jack (Jim True), a friend of Wade's. Not known to do much actual police work (even when handing out a speeding ticket, he gets it thrown back in his face), he decides to be a little suspicious of what happened, and suspects fowl play, even if it does involve a good pal of his. Soon, he discovers what may be a big conspiracy involving his other employer (Holmes Osborn), even if others tell him nothing is going on.
The second story takes off around the same time, involving his father (James Coburn), a stern, gruff, obnoxious sonofabitch who's been drunk most of his life and is notorious around the town for beating his sons up (Coburn, usually not much of a dramatic actor, here is absolutely riveting and brilliant). He's been so bad that his daughter is a characateured born-again Christian, and his other son (Willem Dafoe) has long since left the town and become a college professor. Visiting him one day with his girlfriend (Sissy Spacek), he finds him asleep in his chair and his long-suffering mother dead of cold in her bed. Broken furnace, dad tells him. Wade takes care of the funeral arrangements, and prepares to sell his father's house which means he has to live with him, even if his dad is still a sonofabitch - a decrepit, miserable old man who still drinks too much and bitches about how things aren't like they used to be, "when women knew their place."
Along with his constant troubles with his daughter, whose emotions juxtapose between love and fear, Wade's life slowly begins to implode. Things get out of hand. Nightmarish flashbacks sift through his mind. And he has a toothache and can't get a dentist's appointment. Like Travis Bickle, Wade Whitehouse is tortured by everything that he can't be, but at the same time, is shown that he is in full responsibility of his actions. When he attempts to reopen the divorce so that he can change the custody precedings, we know that it'll only make matters worse, and that his ex-wife, who despises him as it is, will despise him a little more. And slowly, he begins to lose touch with everyone around him, even his girlfriend, whom we're not sure is with him because she honestly loves him or feels pathos for his difficult life. As Wade, Nick Nolte is a pile of fear and defeat but with a smidge of hope, and the latter his often is undoing in the situations he gets himself into. He's constantly told by everyone around him that the shooting was an accident, and that even if it wasn't, he should let it go, but he can't help himself.
Paul Schrader expertly shows us the pain he has to live with, the anguish he feels when he looks in his daughter's eyes and sees resentment, and the misery of having been beaten by and living with a father who doesn't care for him one bit. His well-deserved temper often explodes in fits of anger that are caught right at the second they've erupted, and we just know that at some point, he's going to finally explode in a fit of monumentous anger from supressing his anger for so long. Nolte and Schrader are so good at capturing the mixed emotions of the character and the audience of this character that for his character alone, this film is a triumph, not as classic and masterful as, say, "Taxi Driver" or "Raging Bull," but pretty close. This film has been based on a novel by Russell Banks, the same guy who penned "The Sweet Hereafter," directed by Atom Egoyan, which is probably one of the best films I've ever seen, and like that film, "Affliction" has a cold and sad feel to it, that of loss and pain (great cinematography, too, Paul Sarossy). But while Egoyan's film was masterful and lyrical, this one is more blunt and to-the-point, and in some ways more effective but for the most part, not as. Both contain the weird, occasional pop up of eccentric humor and instances, like the presence of people in wheelchairs who are not more than brief cameos, or unique small town mannerisms.
But "Affliction" does have some real problems. The worst part of the film is easily and without a doubt its use of narration, done by Dafoe's prodigal brother character, who shares his thoughts about the themes, especially in the final minutes. There's a couple movies that I'd like to re-edit and take things out of, just to make them as good as they possibly could be, and mine would be to delete the final minutes of this film. It has such a great ending there, but then it goes on, explaining more than it has to, and discussing the themes, a no-no if you're making a film where the themes are strong, multiple, and even ambiguously placed, like they are in this one.
In fact, the final narration deserves major reprimanding because it takes the story of Wade, such a great story, and turns it into a message-film, preaching against the way fathers beat their sons, because it lives on into further generations. Yawn. We already knew that, right? But take it out, or flat-out ignore it, like I suggest (even leaving a couple minutes early would suffice, and you'll know when to leave), and it's a fantastic movie. Haunting. Saddening. Deeply emotional. After all, all of Wade's problems cannot possibly stem back to beatings, but further instances, and the best thing to do is to show what he's like now, and allow us to see what has affected him and how he deals with them now. Wade's such an interesting character and so complex that this is too good a film to be reduced to an exercise. But I'm almost willing to ignore it, and pay most attention to the rest of the film (even the opening narration isn't totally horrible - it at least sets the story up for a tragic fall, making Wade's attempts to claw out of the inevitable even more profound, as if he had forseen it all already), which is so good and so effortlessly powerful that it's a shame to see it mucked up.
MY RATING (out of 4): ***1/2
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