Five Easy Pieces (1970)
I liked this so much more than I thought I would.
I get why would someone pick something like this for me, and the truth is that I related more to Robert than what's expectable. It's not only the fact that I'm a musician too but because I went through a similar period where I stopped feeling anything, and I stopped having pleasure in what I did. I can tell this film explores that pretty damn well, including the fact that all these choices he makes are very difficult not to make.
My guess is that growing up in a family like that, he simply couldn't take the pressure anymore and he ran away. He started doing a "brainless" job with no direct consequences on him, dating a girl who had no self-esteem so she wouldn't ask him anything in return, everything to stop having people expect something perfect from him. The problem is that those choices are toxic and take you nowhere and it's no wonder he's struggling with them three years after that, so I totally understood when he couldn't take it anymore and just ran away again. I'm guessing to wherever he went, he just restarted the cycle of bad options, because there's simply no easy way out.
Nicholson does a tremendous job portraying a man like this and the film is really all about him. The rest of the characters are not shown any type of growth but they're not supposed to because they're just tools for him to tell his story. I think that I felt exactly the same he did for any of them because they are in some way archetypes to people who I met in my life. And that goes all to say how perfect his performance was.
I also liked how gritty was the whole direction and cinematography. It perfectly adapts to the theme of the film. And the constant juxtaposition of country music with classical music is simply amazing as if the whole personality of the main character was being disputed by two worlds seemingly impossible to combine.
I had some problems with the way he supposedly started liking Catherine because everything felt a bit rushed but I have to remind myself that she was only a tool to show his reaction and to explore his struggle. But then again, it distracted me from the main point, so I guess it could have been done better, though I don't know exactly how. I also didn't care for the section with the lesbians taking a ride, it really didn't add anything to the film. It was not long enough to hurt the pacing but still... The nurse is also not essential and I'm glad the storyline with Bobby's sister was kept to a minimum.
Of course, it's easy to forget those shortcomings once that last scene comes. Damn, it hit me like a ton of bricks...
As I write this, I'm thinking more and more about the film, and I'm liking it more and more, so thank you to whoever picked this.
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