Oddly on some presidential polls Richard M. Nixon shows up on both the positive and negatives sides of the equation. Director Oliver Stone turns his lens to a biopic of the first president to resign. However, you always get the impression that Stone’s vision is more fiction and less fact.
Richard Millhouse Nixon (Anthony Hopkins) is at the beginning of the end of his presidency when some operatives are caught breaking into the democratic headquarters in the Watergate hotel. Nixon ruminates on his presidential and political career and we begin a series of flashbacks.
We see many of the players of the Nixon presidency including his wife Pat Nixon (Joan Allen). The cast is an impressive one including James Woods (H.R. Haldeman), J. T. Walsh (John Erlichman), Powers Boothe (Alexander Haig), Bob Hoskins (J. Edgar Hoover), E.G. Marshall (John Mitchell), Madeline Kahn (Martha Mitchell), David Paymer (press officer Ron Ziegler), David Hyde Pierce (John Dean), Paul Sorvino (Henry Kissinger), and Mary Steenburgen as Nixon’s steely Quaker mother. The cast is top notch.
Hopkins becomes Nixon via his acting ability as little prosthetics are used to recreate Nixon’s familiar visage. This works and doesn’t work as on occasion Hopkins reminded me more of Ed Sullivan than of the reviled president. Paul Sorvino, as Kissinger, seems to be wearing the prosthetic nose that might’ve been Hopkins.
Stone seems to be showing Nixon as a Shakespearian character and the film almost seems Macbeth with Nixon personifying both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth with a touch of Richard the Third thrown in for good measure. It’s obvious that Stone isn’t exactly going to show his subject in any good light, as Hopkins’ Nixon is a cursing, sweating, drunken, troll-like manipulator.
In some ways the film is fascinating, but you often get the impression that Stone has created a historical fiction. I’m not the greatest Nixon scholar but even looking at the presidential portrait on Wikipedia you don’t get the villainous, sweaty vibe that Hopkins and Stone put into the film.
Stone even connects Nixon to the cell of assassination minded Texans (led by Larry Hagman) that he showed in his JFK film. In the end, Nixon feels like a man crushed by history, as he couldn’t handle the pressure.
Nixon is presented in a 1080p high definition transfer (2.40:1). Disc one features two audio commentaries from Oliver Stone. One covers the making of the film and the other is about the politic of the time. Disc two starts off with the new 35-minute “Beyond Nixon” which looks at both Nixon’s legacy and the films. It’s the only special feature presented in high definition.
Next are a collection of deleted scenes that total nearly an hour, along with introductions from Stone. Most of these have been put back into the extended director’s cut on disc one. Next is the 55-minute “Charlie Rose Show” that Stone appeared on to promote the film. Finally, there’s the 4-minute theatrical trailer.
Nixon may have been as horrible as Stone shows or he may have just been a weak man that was crushed by his own ambitions and weaknesses. Stone’s film is entertaining, but it always feels like fiction more than history.
It might’ve helped if Hopkins didn’t look like Ed Sullivan, but it’s still a fascinating portrait but we never forget that it’s through the lens of Oliver Stone.
Nixon (Election Year Edition) [Blu-ray] is now available at Amazon . Visit the DVD database for more information.
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