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Wonderful Movie

Good movie but grossly overrated

Fantastic!

A Masterpiece!

One of the last "actor's movies"of the last Millennium. Every cast member was totally believable. Nick Nolte's character is familiar having known lots of cops & the realization they are human & have problems just like him. Warning: this sheriff has one foot on each side of the law, smokes weed, is divorced,alcoholic & foul-mouthed. Not a role model cop! I loved James Coburn's role as the abusive, alcoholic father of Nolte's character. But then I've always loved Coburn watching him since I was a kid in movies such as The Great Escape, In Like Flint among others. Sissy Spaces delivers a spot-on performance as well. This movie is hard to watch especially if you have suffered parental abuse (non-sexual). But, I can relate to men of that era. The WWII generation men won the war and they didn't do it by sending their kids to learn tap dancing- they taught their sons how to work-even in freezing weather. You know back when men were men, women were women & nobody had to ask.

In a small New Hampshire town Wade (Nick Nolte), a middle-aged man, is unable to gain much purchase on life. Twice divorced from the same woman he is unable to connect with his daughter, at those times that he has parental rights to see her. As the town cop he is hardly a notch above Barney Fife, drinking and smoking pot on the job and beholden to the town mayor. Most everything Wade tries to do turns sour. A central event in the movie is a hunting accident involving the death of a wealthy out-of-state union man who had been accompanied by a young local guide. Wade suspects that the death may have been a murder and his investigation stirs up conflicts with the local power structure. Wade had some theories about the shooting but he did not even conduct a thorough investigation of the crime scene, like the position of the body, the angle of the entry wound, the consistency of the story from the hunter's guide--things thatwould have gone a long way in solving some of the event's mysteries. Even more to the point, there was no search for the bullet that killed the hunter-- that would at least have proved whether the bullet came from the hunter's own gun, and thus have ruled out the theory of an independent shooter. When we meet Wade's father Glenn (James Coburn) we understand a lot about why Wade is the way he is. Glenn is a man who takes out his life's frustrations and failures by drinking and dominating those around him. Coburn gives a remarkable performance--he is physically and emotionally intimidating. My anxiety levels went up every time he was on the screen, and even when not on screen he cast a shadow over the proceedings. My reactions to him were probably similar to Wade's and I could feel what it might be like to live in the shadow of such a man. The score accentuated my anxiety levels. Actors are interesting--how could James Coburn get himself to play such a despicable character so convincingly? I do have to admire his acting here. Willem Defoe turns up as Wade's more stable brother Rolfe. Rolfe had the good sense to escape the toxic family environment of his youth. Unfortunately Wade did not have the spine to stand up to the withering force of his father's personality. Whenever Wade was around his father he reacted to him like he was dealing with a vicious feral animal.Pretty far from the end I had to think that things were not going to end well. The only spark in Wade's life was a relation with a local waitress (Sissy Spacek), but the humiliations Wade had suffered finally culminated in uncontrolled self-destructive behavior.There is an epilogue that wraps things up a bit, but I am not sure of the truth of the comment made there that Wade is an example of someone who broke the chain of abuse; I think his daughter was pretty scared of him. Growing up in such a household as Wade would indeed make future relationships difficult, particularly living in the same small town with such a father.

The sheriff of a frigid New Hampshire town investigates a shooting. The apple does not fall far from the tree. That is what the title refers to. Raised by an abusive father, a man turns out to be a lousy husband and father. The script is sloppy and disjointed, with too many secondary characters crammed in. It moves in fits and starts, but never really settles in and finishes with a whimper. Nolte has some good moments but too often seems to be sleepwalking, delivering his lines in a barely intelligible low growl. Spacek and Dafoe are fine, but neither gets much screen time. Coburn is interesting if a bit too cartoonish in his Oscar-winning role of the father from hell.

An assuredly downbeat, intentionally unpleasant story, adapted by director Paul Schrader from Russell Banks' book, about a divorced, desperate middle-aged man in a snowy small town who is unable to come to terms with his volatile past. James Coburn and Nick Nolte are gripping as father and son, with Coburn winning a Supporting Oscar for his superbly gritty and totally unsympathetic turn; yet, even as the film strikes truthful notes, it lays possibly too much grim material on us. The father is not only abusive and an alcoholic, but something of a psychotic (Schrader treats the three as if they are naturally linked). A sub-plot about a shooting never quite connects with the central situation, and Sissy Spacek isn't given much to do as a long-time acquaintance. Strictly viewed as a showcase for the two actors, worthwhile; but as a movie-going experience, the frozen waste of the land and the uncommunicative relationships left me chilled and unsatisfied. ** from ****