Plot: What’s it about?
Early in the 1990’s, Oliver Stone covered a historical event in history according to him with JFK. In that film, he covered many angles and many theories into one coherent film. Stone did something no other filmmaker was able to accomplish which was take that tragic event in November 1963 and have the public majority think twice about what was reported how it happened and wonder what really happened. In the mid-90s, Stone was to tackle another president, but this time not just about an event. This time, it was about a presidency, it was about a life, it was about Nixon.
A robbery takes place, a mysterious car comes to the White House and in a dim room lit by only the fireplace a dark haired man goes through tapes to see what’s on them. The time is the early 70s and the man is President Richard Nixon. It seemed that one of the men in the robbery is on the White House payroll and Nixon has no choice but to pay him off to keep quiet. This sets off a chain of events to Nixon reflecting back on his life and all his flaws, seen through the eyes of Oliver Stone.
This was a film marred by controversy surrounding the credibility of the events played out in this movie and many inaccuracies. In actuality, the film was based on no source material previously published so it’s a look at Nixon shunning the greatness, but reminding the public he is a human being with some redemptive quality and having his work cut out for him in all directions whether it’s wanting too much power and not acknowledging his wife enough or having the thought that he was solely responsible for convincing the public he was worthy to be elected president when there might have been a lot more powerful players responsible for getting him in that position in the first place.
Anthony Hopkins gives an Oscar-nominated performance as Nixon, not resembling him by appearance but by mannerisms, speech and different color contact lenses. He portrays Nixon as human but with a bit of a bite and teetering on insanity but stabilizing his thoughts when it came to his public image. He leads an all-star cast that provides solid support all around, most especially by Joan Allen, who’s portrayal for Pat Nixon really had this viewer mistakening her for the real life figure she was playing.
The result of this film may not have the thought provoking edge of JFK or the realistic sick truth of Natural Born Killers but an intriguing portrait into one of our nations most flawed individuals wonderfully played out by Oliver Stone, both in direction and in the script (co-written with Christopher Wilkinson and Stephen J. Revele).
Video: How does it look?
This is the second release of this title on DVD and it is a slight improvement over the previous featureless release. The film is shot in the 2.40:1 aspect ratio and it is a transfer that goes through many stocks of film and intercuts in between but not missing from those cuts are it’s clarity and the transfer has a cleaner effect than it’s previous release although hints of grain occur at a few of the same spots but not as repeatedly as the previous release.
Audio: How does it sound?
The audio on the other hand is a bigger improvement from the booming Oscar nominated score surrounded beautifully across all channels but in the sound effects whether it’s the slamming of a door or the roar of thunder on a rainy night. The audio does alternate between speeches where the more open ones are louder than the studio ones but overall, captures the sound sharply and beautifully. This disc also has French and Spanish subtitles.
Supplements: What are the extras?
The original release, as noted in the Video section, was featureless. In this 2 Disc incarnation we have an extended cut of the movie incorporating some deleted scenes from the original cut reinserted and some make for a little more of a compelling movie. Two commentary tracks are on Disc 1 and neither one disappoints although the second one has more gaps that the first, they both complement themselves as the first goes into more of the meat of the production while the second goes into more of a historical view of the film.
On Disc Two, we are treated to a full length episode of Charlie Rose in which Stone is interviewed. It’s a challenging interview where he has Charlie for a loss on a few occasions but manages to hold his own to make for an intriguing look. We are also served with more deleted scenes which provide for interest little extensions and irrelevant bits that didn’t hurt the film from inclusion or disclusion. They all get nice little intros and good explanations from the director and provide for good lead-ins to the scenes. Finally we get the film’s theatrical trailer and, though it’s a good one, I kind of wish that they had included the teaser, but one trailer is better than none. Another trip into Oliver Stone land and another very well done Two Disc set.
