ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST: Blu-ray (Fantasy Films/UA, 1975) Warner Home Video
BEST PICTURE –
1975
Based on Ken
Kesey’s novel of the same name, and considered by many to be among the greatest
movies of all time, Miloš Forman’s One
Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) follows the mismanaged exploits of one
Randle Patrick McMurphy (Jack Nicholson); a convict, charged with statutory
rape who fakes insanity to escape hard labor in prison. Convinced that McMurphy
has indeed lost his mind, the warden transfers him to a ‘maximum security’
asylum for rehabilitation. The facility is overseen by Mildred Ratched (Louise
Fletcher); a superficially congenial nurse employing subtle humiliation, drug
therapy, and, a debilitating regiment of menial exercises to keep her patients
sufficiently anesthetized. Oddly enough, McMurphy seems to fit right in. He
delights at ‘playing’ with the fragile psyches of his fellow patients; the
reclusive, Ellis (Michael Berryman), perpetually horny and delusional, Martini
(Danny DeVito), neurotic Billy (Dan Dourif), pseudo-frustrated intellectual,
Frederickson (Vincent Schiavelli) and stoic deaf/mute Chief Bromden (Will
Samson) until he realizes that what is entirely lacking from this hospital
environment is any genuine sense of hope for rehabilitation. Instead, Ratched
and her staff seem content to maintain the patients in their perennially vegetative
stage.
Actor Kirk
Douglas, who had originated McMurphy on Broadway in 1963, purchased the rights,
hoping against hope to convince a studio to finance One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest as a movie with himself cast in the
lead. Begrudgingly denied over the next decade, Douglas eventually handed over
the rights to his son, Michael – then, an aspiring actor. Douglas Sr. then
nearly 60, thought the movie might still be made with at least his son’s
participation. But the junior Douglas did not feel a strong connection to McMurphy,
although he did find the novel a very compelling read. Determined to produce
the movie version, Michael Douglas brought in Saul Zaentz as co-producer; Zaentz,
immediately recommending 38-year-old Jack Nicholson for the lead. Justly
regarded today as one of the preeminent actors to emerge from the latter half
of the 20th century, Nicholson in 1975 was hardly what one might
consider a ‘hot commodity’. In fact, the actor had been bumbling around Hollywood
since 1954 – then, as an office assistant for William Hanna and Joseph Barbera
at MGM.
Trained at
Players Ring Theater, Nicholson’s fifties aspirations fell into menial bit
parts on low budget TV soap operas, and a brief and unprepossessing movie debut
in the forgettable potboiler, The Cry
Baby Killer (1958). An alliance with filmmaker, Roger Corman did nothing to
jump start Nicholson’s big-time career plans, despite appearing to good effect
in several of Corman’s cult/camp classics, including The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), The Raven (1963), and, The
St. Valentine's Day Massacre (1967) – the same year, Nicholson shifted gears
to write the screenplay for The Trip
– a movie costarring Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper. But it was on Fonda and
Hopper’s other project - Easy Rider
(1969), that Nicholson would break out to popular appeal, promoting himself as
the hero of the counter-culture movement – a moniker crystalized in his next
movie, Five Easy Pieces (1970). Interestingly,
Nicholson’s persona, as the lovable bastard, did not immediately ingratiate him
for bigger and better things; 1971’s Carnal
Knowledge, and 1973’s The Last
Detail, earning the actor much attention and praise, but not exactly more
plum parts to keep the momentum going. For this, it would take two consecutive
strokes of good luck: the first, Roman Polanski’s sublime revisionist
noir/thriller, Chinatown (1974) in
which Nicholas played the brazen gumshoe with relish and a certain disinterest for
the niceties, and, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s
Nest – Nicholson, seemingly, at last left mostly to his own accord, exploding
in full force of his actor’s acumen; his Randle P. McMurphy, running the gamut
from ‘A’ to ‘Z’ – along the way, earning our contempt and admiration, for a
performance that qualifies as one of the truly outstanding ever given by an
actor.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest unequivocally
represents the early high-water mark in Nicholson’s movie career; the actor,
unleashing a lifetime of personal regrets on this anti-authoritarian diatribe
as the unwitting and very reluctant patient in a mental hospital. One
Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is widely regarded today, not only for
Nicholson’s performance, but as the movie to tie the standard bearer – Frank Capra’s
It Happened One Night (1934) – as only
the second movie in Oscar history to win all 5 major awards: Best Director,
Screenplay, Actor, Actress and Best Picture. Cast opposite Nicholson was
another hopeful, Danny DeVito; the two men discovering each was from the same
neighborhood in New Jersey and thereafter establishing a lifelong friendship.
And, while the picture is imbued with an exceptional roster of talent in front
of the camera, including DeVito, Scatman Crothers, Will Sampson (who came
recommended for the part of Chief Bromden by a used car salesman) and Michael
Berryman, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s
Nest almost exclusively belongs to Nicholson’s smart ass/reprobate, and his
affecting battle royale with Louise Fletcher’s Nurse Ratched. If Nicholson’s
energy propels the story forward, Fletcher’s disturbing Ratched is its terrifying
antithesis.
Like Nicholson,
Louise Fletcher had begun her career on TV – appearing briefly in serials, Lawman (1958), Maverick, and, The Untouchables
(the latter two efforts, both in 1959). And despite receiving good reviews for
her work, the likelihood of stardom seemed fairly elusive. Continuing with two
guest appearances on Perry Mason in
1960, Fletcher’s fallow period dogged her until 1974’s Thieves Like Us, co-produced and directed by Robert Altman. A creative rift between Fletcher and Altman resulted
in Altman recasting the part of Linnea Reese – a mother with a deaf son – in his
classic ensemble piece, Nashville (1975);
a particularly bitter affront as this role had been envisioned with Fletcher in
mind. Born to deaf parents, Fletcher could definitely relate to the role. Only
in hindsight was Nashville’s loss Fletcher’s
gain, as director, Miloš Forman, thoroughly impressed with her performance in Thieves Like Us, eventually cast her as
McMurphy's arch nemesis in One Flew Over
the Cuckoo's Nest, though not before auditioning more prominent actresses,
including Angela Lansbury, Anne Bancroft, and Geraldine Page for the part. Ultimately,
Forman made the right decision, as Fletcher proves bone-chilling as the glacially
cool caregiver in name only, remote on the surface, though perhaps harboring
ulterior motives in her thorough relish to keep the inmates under her thumb.
The picture’s
first screenwriter, Lawrence Hauben introduced Michael Douglas to Miloš Forman.
Forman flew to California, but surprised Douglas by going through the
screenplay, virtually line by line, clearly outlining what he would do with the
material. Meanwhile, producer, Saul Zaentz felt a certain affinity for Kesey’s
authorship. Thus, after Hauben had already
submitted his first draft, Zaentz quietly asked Kesey to re-write the
screenplay, dangling the carrot of participation in front of the author’s nose.
Contractually, Zaentz had no right to do this, and, in the end, Kesey received
nothing for his efforts. Instead, it all ended up in a very public financial
dispute. At first considered to direct the picture, Hal Ashby – who had
previously worked with Jack Nicholson, now suggested Nicholson for the lead, causing
a delay of 6 months to accommodate the actor’s schedule. As Danny DeVito was
Michael Douglas’ dearest friend, he was first to be cast, having already played
‘Martini’ in the 1971 off-Broadway production.
Determined the movie should be ‘true to life’ –
Douglas had his actors attend patients inside a similar facility, with Nicholson
and Fletcher observing electro-convulsive therapy. Shooting for 3
months in the Oregon State Hospital, a fully functioning mental hospital,
Douglas elected to cast the hospital’s director, Dean Brooks as the movie’s
fictional Dr. John Spivey. Extremely
supportive of the project, Brooks was also instrumental in identifying a
patient whose behaviors mirrored the fictional counterparts; the actors
shadowing their subjects to gain further insight into their parts. A few of the
cast even elected to spend the night in the ward. Evidently, Brooks kept knowledge of their
criminally insane behavior to himself, fearing producers would pull out of the project.
Meanwhile, creative differences sprang up between the picture’s cinematographer,
Haskell Wexler and Milos Forman.
Eventually, Bill Butler replaced Wexler – the divergent
reasons given for the latter's dismissal, never entirely clarified. While
Forman tells that his decision was exclusively based on artistic differences, Wexler
sincerely believed he was fired due to his concurrent work on the documentary
Underground. Although Wexler and Butler would both receive Oscar nominations
for Best Cinematography, in reviewing the assembled picture, Wexler later
claimed all but a minute or two of the final cut had actually been shot by him.
Minor delays resulted in the original $2
million budget doubling; Zaentz, casually borrowing against his company,
Fantasy Records to cover the overruns, and, well-rewarded when the movie went on
to gross $109 million in North America alone.
The plot of the film kicks into high gear as McMurphy determines he should not lose his own sanity while under lock and key and decides to
liberate the rest of the patients from Nurse Ratched’s tyranny, at one point,
stealing a bus and taking his fellow inmates on a lark and fishing expedition
that understandably infuriates the hospital’s administrative staff. McMurphy
further incurs Nurse Ratched's wrath by suggesting that he and 'his friends' should not be physically
restrained and/or drugged into submission, simply because they are bothersome. During
a group therapy session, one of the patients, Cheswick (Sidney Lassick) suffers
a breakdown that results in a brawl between the orderlies, McMurphy and Chief
Bromden. The three are restrained and sent for electroshock therapy to
'correct' their behavior and Randle begins to realize that faking his own
'insanity' might not have been such a good idea. With his own release from the
hospital no longer assured, Randle plots to breakout.
He bribes the
night guard to allow his gal pal, Candy (Marya Small, in a part originally
intended for Shelley Duvall) and her friend, Rose (Louisa Moritz) into the
facility with some booze so the boys can have themselves a party. The next
morning Ratched discovers Billy and Candy together. His stutter is cured. But
when Ratched informs Billy she is going to tell his mother what he has done,
his stutter returns. Billy locks himself in the doctor's office and commits
suicide. Randle is so outraged by Ratched’s cruelty he attacks and attempts to
strangle her before being knocked unconscious by one of the guards. Much later,
Chief Bromden spies Randle being led to his room. Believing he is preparing for
their escape from the hospital, Bromden quietly sneaks in, but is horrified to
discover Randle has been lobotomized. Rather than allow him the indignation of
this catatonic state, Bromden smothers Randle with his pillow, then escapes by
smashing through one of the windows.
In this
penultimate blow for freedom, One Flew
Over the Cuckoo's Nest delivers a strange, if unsettling enlightenment, its
dénouement, queerly exuberant. Milos Forman has constructed an insular world
that becomes, if not home, then home-like and oddly familiar. Lawrence Hauben
and Bo Goldman's screenplay maintains a kinetic balancing act between every
character in this ensemble. Forman gets up close to these characters, allowing
the drama to naturally develop from within. The unlikely shift from Nicholson’s
enigmatic McMurphy, whose light is dimmed before the final curtain call, to Sampson’s
towering mute of a monument, however briefly self-liberated, creates an unnerving
disconnect in the movie's anti-heroic arc of self-discovery; Chief Bromden,
rediscovering his own strength of character, blossoming from the demise of the only man who,
seemingly, could never be conquered. In the last moments of this high-octane drama, we find the
unerring human spirit, reconnected, alive and well; or rather, its torch passed on
to the least likely of candidates meant to carry it forward.
Warner Home
Video marked One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s
Nest’s 35th Anniversary with a Blu-ray padded out with swag and extra
features. Alas, what’s actually on the disc is the same 1080p transfer previously available as a single disc. This is not necessarily bad, but
'Anniversary Editions' are supposed to be about offering the home consumer
definitive hi-def transfers. We don't get it here. Color and contrast levels remain
weaker than expected. Flesh tones are pasty pink at best. Whites exhibit a dull,
slightly bluish tint. Film grain is present, but appears to have had DNR
liberally applied. No – no waxy images, but grain that fluctuates from
prominent in long shots, to practically non-existent in close-ups. The audio is
a bigger disappointment: 5.1 Dolby Digital rather than a DTS upgrade. Extras
include an audio commentary from Milos Forman. It's the same commentary as
before. We also get the 86 min. 'Completely
Cuckoo' - a thorough look back at the making of the film, as well as a 31
min. featurette on the improvements made to real mental health institutions
since the movie’s debut. A few deleted scenes and a theatrical trailer are also
included. Again, Warner pads out the extras with reproduced lobby cards, poster
art and a booklet that is glossy but tragically short on production details.
Bottom line: recommended, with caveats.
FILM RATING (out of 5 - 5 being the best)
4
VIDEO/AUDIO
3
EXTRAS
3
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