THE ASSASSINATION OF RICHARD NIXON FILM REVIEW

The Assassination of Richard Nixon carries the perfect tagline The Mad Story of A True Man. Based on real life it finds the heart and soul of a historical event through a devastating character study of it's prime participant Sam Bicke played with breath taking complexity by Sean Penn. It's a performance than in any genuine assessment of the years performances should garner him another Oscar nomination.

THE ASSASSINATION OF RICHARD NIXON
Think Film
Dir Niels Mueller
95 Min Rated R for language and violence

Sean Penn's 2003 Best Actor Oscar for Mystic River brought well-deserved attention to an actor who has consistently put craft above the other rewards associated with a successful acting career. To be sure he makes a good living but he also has consistently given of himself to projects that would probably have gone unfinanced and unmade without his help. It's a pleasure to say If I were to give him an award for the performance of his career it would easily go to his performance in his new film The Assassination of Richard Nixon.

The Assassination of Richard Nixon is based on a true story. There really was a Sam Bicke and he really did try to assassinate Richard Nixon. It's just that, until recently, not much attention has been paid to his effort. That you find that last sentence surprising was what made Bicke's story so compelling for first time director Niels Mueller who had already set out to write a fictional script about a lone loser who decides to assassinate a president only to have his attempt go unnoticed. After having written 30 some pages Mueller discovered Bicke while researching, and by working with surviving relatives crafted a story that while not entirely historically accurate offers a compelling look at how empathy can become lost to ideology.

We pick up Bicke's story in 1974 at the tail end of what has been called America's decade of shocks involving the death of the hippy movement, assassinations, and Vietnam. A failed marriage and inability to hold a job have beaten Bicke down but so have many of his own choices. We sense, and one gets a sense that Mueller would agree with this, that Bicke is not a casual victim of society but a child coming clumsily of age and horribly surprised to find out that the world is not fair and prone to irrational lashing out, false stands that ultimately set him at odds with any possible support system.

Legally separated from, yet holding out false hope of reconciliation with, his wife and children, Bicke has already started collapsing in on himself. He increasingly loathes his new job as an office furniture salesman because he is convinced that to get ahead he must ethically compromise himself. And yet we see him keep trying to define himself, valuate his existence, via the "American Dream." There's something mesmerizing about watching Bicke watch the world, immobilized by his then state of the art TV which is physically tethered to a remote as Cadillac commercials and footage of Watergate float through the room. Why Bicke made the stand he did even as he held on to his warped idealism is the central mystery the film explores. A friend of mine, also a critic, has said that despite Penn's brilliant performance perhaps a better story would have involved Bicke identifying with Nixon due to their mutual unraveling.

Yet we know that in real life Bicke came to see Nixon as symbolic of all the corruption around him not as a fellow victim of conspiracy. Even more compelling are the chunks of voiceover narration using Bicke's actual recordings sent to various famous people that he felt would help the world understand the nature of his despicable actions.

As in almost all mania there is just enough truth about what Bicke has to say about the rich and the powerful and the falseness of the American dream to give one pause. For my own part I find Bicke story not so much emotionally resonant but vitally important allowing us to encounter the complexity of Bicke situation, which involve both Bicke's own choices and the casual coldness of the society around him. Why do we encourage everyone to chase Cadillacs, become "self-made men" when clearly our society cannot function if everyone takes that road?

One of Mueller's best insights is the humor of Bicke's situation. 2004 was not the year of the subtle political satire but Mueller and Penn expertly walk the line between desperation and irony painting a picture of a man truly lost and expected to fend for himself in a world that does not so much reward effort as much as success and it's in Assassination's sense of humor that Mueller finds the heart of Bicke's pathos. As the character becomes less empathetic of course his choices seem to make less sense and yet in a larger sense Bicke is making of his life a massive irony.

In one pitch perfect sequence he visits the Black Panthers to donate money but also to suggest the formation of a new movement that includes whites and blacks. The name of the group he comes up with is almost funnier than his assertion that "it will double your membership." That Bicke believes this is not really in question but his motive for doing so is also tied to his desire to stand with someone else who wants to hold society accountable; to not be alone.

Bicke said in one of his tapes that perhaps if he had been hugged more he might not have needed to do what he did. I won't provide any details about his plot or excuse his actions as those of someone who just needed more love. But the film doesn't let Bicke off that easy either. It simply suggests none of us should feel off the hook when it comes to the desperation of our fellow man. Even if one holds that Bicke's vision of the world was ultimately a selfish one filled with the trappings of success it still is important to ask where he was to encounter a bigger better vision. The real irony is that Watergate ultimately did what Bicke could not- it assassinated a corrupt man and shed light on a corrupt system. What sort of process was needed for Sam Bicke to survive his own warped ethics?

Dave Canfield