Frost/Nixon Movie Review

Frost/Nixon (2008 film)

So since Thomas James Michael Babygurwell Henson introduced the movie game to us, I've made it a point to try to know about as many movies as I can, just so I can contend with his vast knowledge of cinema. To be honest, I already knew a lot about movies, but he and I had very different ways of learning about movies: he used his free time to watch movies and learned which actors and actresses were in which movie that way, while I used my free time to go on Wikipedia and read all the articles about the movies and actors who had won Academy Awards, and I would go on a sort of Wiki-spree, hopping from article to article, spending hours in front of my computer with one hand on the mouse, the other hand on my chin holding up my massive cranium. As of recent though, I've decided it'd be better for me to actually watch these movies that I've heard so much about and see if I actually like them. Shoutout to the folks over at www.moviewatch.in for uploading basically every movie in the history of cinema with excellent quality and allowing me to feed my appetite. So the first movie I decided to watch was Frost/Nixon.

Immediately following the scandal that was the Watergate affair, President Nixon (played by Frank Langella) became the first and only President to ever resign from office. He was able to retain his dignity and emerged from this still smiling and holding up the V for Victory. Across the pond, British TV show host David Frost (played by Michael Sheen) decided that it'd be fascinating to do a series of televised interviews with the President so that the President could express all of his sentiments in a medium that all of the American people could see. For a large sum of money, the President agreed to four televised interviews, each of which would focus on a different topic of the President's regime. With the help of his chief of security and closest advisor (played by Kevin Bacon) Nixon was able to steer the first three interviews in a direction that allowed him to present himself in an overwhelmingly positive light, which wasn't what Frost and his team had been aiming for. It wasn't until the fourth episode that Frost was able to maintain his composure, prevent the President from rambling on, and force him to answer questions. It was during this scene that my favorite dialogue of the entire movie occurred:

Nixon: "When you're in office, you gotta do a lot of things sometimes that are not always, in the strictest sense of the law, legal, but you DO them because they're in the greater interest of the nation!"

Frost: "Wait hold on, just so I understand. Are you really saying that in certain situations the president can decide whether it's in the best interest of the nation... and then do something illegal?"

Nixon: "I'm saying that when the President does it, that means it's not illegal."

Can you say POWERFUL! The caliber of acting in this scene is ridiculous, Frank Langella was literally the perfect person to be cast for this role. I never knew President Nixon personally, however I feel as though Langella looked as much like him as it would have been possible for anyone else to. But yeah, the big thing with Nixon was that people believed that he wasn't remorseful for letting the American people down and committing such a crime. The above quote just went on to rubberstamp the idea that he didn't feel bad about what he did, because in his eyes, he never broke the law. Basically, the interviews were a huge success and catapulted David Frost into ridiculous stardom.

I loved this movie. I don't usually lean towards dramatic movies; I think my completely carefree and lighthearted nature would indicate that I like comedic movies. But when I like a dramatic movie, I REALLY like it. The acting was what made this movie great. Frank Langella is an acting legend and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in this film, an accolade that I believe was very well deserved. Michael Sheen, most well-known for his role in The Queen (with Helen Mirren), did a great job too in my opinion. I'd say his performance was worthy of a nomination, the way he portrayed Frost's insistence to remain positive even when the interviews seemed to be turning out as a failure. However his role wasn't minor enough to be considered a Supporting Actor, and he definitely would not be able to stand up to the Best Actor nominees of that year, a category that included, along with Langella, the eventual winner Sean Penn for Milk. I do think that the movie was a little slow at times, but when it was intense, it definitely was intense. Like when they were getting ready to start the first interview and Nixon asks Frost about how his night was and he goes "Did you do any fornicating?" just to throw him off. and Frost is like =O. Brilliant. Great movie, I'd recommend it to everyone.

Of course, seeing this movie made me want to see the actual interviews, which can be found on YouTube (duh) thanks to the phenomenal nature of today's internet. However, the interviews were definitely not as interesting as the movie mad them seem, and the camera shot was definitely a lot tighter than in the movie. Personally I'm not ok with Nixon's huge forehead glaring at me so I had to get myself out of there.

HOLLA! Go see this movie ASAP! btw ignore the time stamp, the website is down.... ;)