I went to see Mortal Kombat: Frost/Nixon Cage Match today.
- The faux documentary style of the film featuring interviews of key players presumably looking back on their role in the Frost/Nixon affair was unnecessary, kind of cheesy, and lent the whole production an air of made-for-TV quality. I’m 95% sure you can find this on the History channel already somewhere, although I suppose Ron Howard gets bonus points for not having to deal with commercial interruption. I don’t know if this is how the play is structured, but if it is then it doesn’t translate well on screen.
- They went a little overboard with the hand-to-hand combat metaphors, what with both Frost and Nixon saying “YOU ARE A WORTHY OPPONENT” every ten seconds. WE GET IT. When Frost looked like he was down for the count and that he was never going to recover from Nixon nearly exonerating himself in the first three interview sessions, I wanted a deep-voiced narrator to come on saying “FINISH HIM!“
- Dear President Nixon: It’s probably in your best interests to not drunk dial me in the middle of the night. Love, David Frost.
- I don’t understand the purpose of the Caroline Cushing character. She meets Frost on a plane and apparently her run in with him is enough to make her take up living arrangements with him for the next several years, her sole functions apparently being army candy and deli gopher. I get that if a person was, historically, in the story as it took place they should probably be in the movie version but… yeah.
- Kevin Bacon was basically Nixon’s personal bodyguard and biggest fanboy. I like this because in JFK, Bacon’s character says, “That motherfucker Kennedy stole that motherfuckin’ election [...] Nixon was gonna be one of the great presidents ’till Kennedy wrecked it up.” Speaking of Kennedy, Oliver Platt’s impersonation of Nixon’s potential answers to questions was hilarious when he had Nixon comparing himself to Kennedy.
- I think I am a fan of Sam Rockwell.
- Frost has continuous trouble during the interview process in lining up enough money to actually finance and air the interviews. It seems to me he could have saved a lot of money if he had stayed at a less swanky hotel, but I suppose personal comfort should not be sacrificed in the name of justice through the media.
- It makes me happy that Captain Picard’s BFF from the Academy was in this as one of Nixon’s Secret Service attendants. If Nixon ever needs a dom-jot table rigged or wants to start a bar fight with a group of angry Nausicaans, he knows where to turn.
- Bottom line there’s some really good acting in this movie and all of the characters (save Ms. Cushing) are nicely fleshed out with complex motives and emotions even if those characters don’t get a lot of screen time. I don’t know, it’s like The Queen and I feel like movies about stuff that happened on TV don’t necessarily make for super riveting films.
Categories: 3 Stars
Okay, Slumdog was way better than this piece of crap where the only good part was Langella.
3. Honestly, I had a little bit of a problem with that scene… When I first saw this scene, I thought it was merely a dramatic device for Frost realizing WHY Nixon treats him in this way, i.e. that it all takes place in his mind. Nixon just didn’t strike me as so drunk that he would end up not knowing what had happened on the next day (and the actor did play him as genuinely puzzled, as not knowing). It was only later that I learned that Nixon was prone to phoning his aides or associates in the night with his demands and later forgot about it because of the medication he had to take. So now I do think that even though this scene never took place in real life, we are at least meant to think that it does take place within the context of the movie/play. There is also a scene after the interviews where Nixon takes Frost aside asking him if he really phoned him that night and what he said to him – and Frost does not tell him because, having come to empathize with Nixon. knows that the ex-President would be mortified about having “lost it” during that night – so not telling he helps him preserve at least a shred of dignity. For even though Frost had “won” the “match” against Nixon, his victory is not a triumph: Because of the similarities between Forst and Nixon, Nixon’s defeat also is, in a way, Frost’s own, or at least he knows exactly how Nixon is feeling, and so even becomes a little “protective” of him.
4. I don’t agree with you at all…For one thing, there is a thread running through the texture of the whole movie how similar Frost and Nixon are in a way, and there is a parallel shown between them on the day of the first interview, with Pat seeing off Nixon and wishing him luck and Cushing doing the same with Frost. But more importantly, Cushing is the character who encourages us not to take Frost’s happy-go-lucky, always-smiling attitude for granted, and to see him as a person. She has sized him up the moment she first sees him, pointing out that he has “very sad eyes” and asking him if he’s a sad person – which causes that smile of his to be plastered only more firmly in his face. If this scene and this character were not there, we would certainly judge Frost differently. She is also the only one who sees Frost as a human being, the only person to whom he need not “prove” himself as far as she is concerned. I think that especially the Reston and Zelnick characters have an exasperating tendency of treating Frost as if he were working for them rather than they for him, attacking him constantly when things do not go the way they think they should. But she is always trying to cheer him up and comfort him, telling him that this whole project is a big achievement already as it is.
6. Me too – I was really surprised at seeing him in a “serious” role for the first time – he has that intensity, I have also seen it in other roles. A friend of mine who has seen him in MOON even told me his performance had been “Oscar-worthy”.