Evan D. As a project this year we are taking a trip through time to revisit all of the Best Picture winners in history, Wings to Anora. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is the forty-eighth film in that series, to see all the other Best Picture reviews, click here. R P McMurphy (Jack Nicholson) is undoubtedly a scumbag. A sexual deviant, a small time thief, a creep. There is one critical thing R P McMurphy is not, mentally ill. This turns out to be an important distinction as the sleazy conman at the center of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest finds himself involuntarily committed to the Oregon State Mental Hospital. Don’t write him off too much, this is all by design. McMurphy thought a stint in the asylum would be a lighter sentence than the hard labor he faced in prison. He feigned madness to ease his burden and ended up in the clutches of a far more cruel warden. Although his quick wit wins over his fellow patients, the head nurse Mildred Ratched (Louise Fletcher) is not quite so keen on his antics. Their rivalry may just prove enough to tear the ward apart. After many fits and starts over more than a decade, this adaptation of Ken Kesey’s novel of the same name found a director in Miloš Forman and ultimately hit screens in 1975. Forman’s style here is rather workmanlike. There is not a lot of bombast here as he gets the job done and lets the script and actors speak for themselves. In a way it works to accentuate the mundanity of life in the mental hospital. That scene leaves a pristine environment, enforced stringently by Ratched, for McMurphy to tear apart. Letting the characters and environment lead turns out to be a brilliant calculation. For all his irredeemable wickedness, Forman is able to turn McMurphy into an icon of oppression. Ratched controls every moment of life on the ward down to the second and alters the rules to her benefit whenever possible. She wades into the intimate details of her patients’ lives in group sessions that cannot help but induce cringes. Fletcher plays her with such a cold distance that it becomes hard to see any humanity in the dictatorial nurse. What works so well for the film is the way Ratched plays against Nicholson’s McMurphy. His charisma and amiability with the other patients creates a hero out of a person we would normally think of as disposable. That in and of itself is an impressive feat of empathy, something we need more of when we tell the stories of incarcerated folks and the mentally ill. But as a piece of storytelling it sets up this epic, almost Biblical, battle between good and evil. For as challenging as the material is — criminals, the mentally ill and a beautiful plot about the treatment of Native people — One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is massively entertaining. Nicholson fills up every frame and star making supporting performances from Brad Dourif, Danny DeVito, Scatman Crothers, Christopher Lloyd and, dear lord, Will Sampson supplement him brilliantly. McMurphy’s plight against Ratched is tremendous storytelling. Another one of those Best Picture winners that has stood the test of time, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is undeniable. Fletcher and Nicholson, both Oscar winners for these roles, turn in two of the most nuanced performances you’ll ever see. One of the rare films that has so much on its mind and manages to entertain so brilliantly. 9/10
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