Opie Overrated: Frost/Nixon is just the next in line

One February not too long from now, on an Oscar night not too far away, Ron Howard is gonna get a standing “o” as he walks up to receive that infamous Lifetime Achievement Award. Hollywood luminaries young and old will applaud and nod their heads earnestly, with that “Yes. Yes. Great career, great career” look on their smug faces. A few scant tears will even appear. The montage that precedes his speech will scroll through the usual suspects: Cocoon, Apollo 13, Cinderella Man, and of course, A Beautiful Mind.

It will be a friggin farce.

Frost/Nixon will be a part of that montage as well. And just like the rest of Howard’s catalogue, it will be incorrectly be looked upon as a major work from a major director. Because Frost/Nixon is just the next overrated, overwrought film in Howard’s long line of repulsively commercial efforts – that started off as harmless pleasers like Splash and evolved into pretentious, clichéd blockbusters like Backdraft and Far and Away, until finally reaching the pitiful lows of The DaVinci Code.

The direction in Frost/Nixon is completely lacking in inspiration. Howard shows little to no interest whatsoever in taking any real risks, or doing anything remotely original. Instead, he relies on the old, familiar look and feel of his previous period-pieces. Like the rest of his films, from a shot-making perspective, it’s basically paint-by-numbers. Safe, sure, spineless.

The results of the few non-standard choices Howard does make range from inconsistent to downright incompetent. These are evident from the very beginning, as he  employs the use of mockumentary-style interviews with some of the supporting characters for exposition. It comes off as awkward, gimmicky and false because the film is, well, not a mockumentary.

Even worse is his often-times incomprehensible use of lighting. For some reason, he appears to have a near-fetish need for shadows – often across the principal characters faces (and at key moments, no less). This occurs primarily indoors, as evidenced in a scene at the Plaza Hotel in New York City. It’s either early morning or late afternoon, and the sun is presumably streaming in between the curtains. The execution is laughably bad – you can tell they just set up huge floodlights right outside of the window on set. The scene is marred with blinding ultra-washouts of brightness along with distracting jagged shadows. Instead of a soft, glowing sunlight effect that would have made the actors expressions dance, they look ill in the light (and hidden in the dark).  I suppose you could say it served the purpose of symbolizing Nixon’s shadiness…but he does it with virtually all of the characters. Later on, during the interview scenes, the background shadow effect is used to highlight the tete-a-tete between the titular foes, and it does work there.

Frost is played with dynamic aplomb by Michael Sheen, a rising talent who nails all of Frost’s charming highs and exasperating lows with equal skill. His playboy spark gives the film instant life. At first, the project is a brash, brazen career move for the TV host/entertainer (“just think of the numbers it’ll get”), but Sheen deftly handles Frost’s gradual realization that unless he gets the goods on Nixon, the whole endeavor will ultimately be professionally ruinous for him.

As well, the tower of talent that is Frank Langella pulls off an excellent Nixon. Although he does make some strange choices – he gives Nixon’s oft-imitated voice a languid, rolling garble (in reality his diction was actually quite sharp) – he still manages to lend him that larger-than-life, presidential aura; that eerie magnetism that is innate and unmistakable. Langella gives Nixon gravitas, despite his reputation. He goads Frost for most of the film, assuming he has the upper hand intellectually, confident he’ll emerge victorious and re-claim his stature with the American people. But he challenges him on nearly every level, almost as if, deep down, he wants to admit his guilt and get it all off his chest…but only if Frost has the balls to step up and get it out of him. Nixon opens the door, Frost just has to have the courage to walk through it. Langella prods, teases, drills and growls his way into his adversary’s head. It’s a virtuoso performance.

Unfortunately, rest of the cast doesn’t pan out as well. The usually reliable Kevin Bacon comes of as weak and ineffectual. I’m sure it was a character choice by Bacon to show the shallowness of  Tricky Dick’s post-Presidency chief protector, but it just doesn’t work . Playing against type is one thing, having been miscast is another.  As well, the normally engaging Sam Rockwell and the always interesting Oliver Platt, as Frost’s co-producers, are rendered  mostly flat as well. Worst of all, the role of Frost’s girlfriend serves literally no purpose whatsoever.   

Don’t get me wrong – Frost/Nixon is not a bad film. It just could have been infinitely better. There are those tense, explosive moments, like Nixon’s late-night call to Frost and of course their final showdown, that leave the average audience member (and most critics) satisfied. Give most film school grads a multi-million dollar budget, and few would completely drop the ball with subject matter this historic, engaging and relevant. After all, the Frost-Nixon interviews really did happen, and they were a media phenomenon at the time. Add that to the fact that this fictionalized version of the events was first a successful play – with Sheen and Langella in the original roles – and you’ve got as sure-fire a success as any in Hollywood.

Ron Howard’s (non) progression as a filmmaker mirrors his career as a child actor: Opie turned into Richie, but he never really grew up – he just got older. Time passed, but nothing else really changed.