With a nod to Charles Dickens's Scrooge

Rating: 10/10 (28 July 2004)

(Note: Over 500 of my movie reviews are now available in my book "Cut to the Chaise Lounge or I Can't Believe I Swallowed the Remote!" Get it at Amazon.)
Brilliantly written, brilliantly acted and cleanly directed, this strange and wonderful tale is one of the best romantic comedies ever to hit the silver screen. Helen Hunt, as an unmarried thirtysomething waitress with a asthmatic five-year-old boy, is exquisite. Jack Nicholson, as a weird and mean obsessive compulsive writer named Melvin Udall, is even better than he usually is, and he is one of the great actors of our time, and even Greg Kinnear in a supporting role as the sensitive gay guy next door is outstanding.
Of course I love impossible love, unrequited love, love that takes decades to culmination. This is a case of impossible love come true. Eat your heart out Nora Ephron! And you too Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks. But I couldn't help but think, considering the principals, how impossible it really is on another level. But never mind, in fact, all the better.
James L. Brooks, who directed and who, along with Mark Andrus (from his story) wrote the script, is to be highly commended. The concept of an obsessive compulsive, self-centered (almost autistic) older guy, set in his ways beyond anything normal finding love is just wondrous strange. And a patient and caring, under-achieving, under-appreciated Manhattan waitress in a house dress, finding not just love but somebody who really knows who she is and what she's worth is also just wonderful.
Wonderful, yes. A wonderful movie to lift the spirit. But As Good As It Gets is more than that. The dialogue is sharp and witty and big-city sophisticated and sometimes laugh out loud funny. The underlying statements about relationships and love in urban America are subtle and thought-provoking. So much is said beside the point. Yes, off to the side we find some street hustlers juxtaposed with someone sensitive, and we see how irrelevant they are and how he overcomes them and this brutal thing they have done to him. And off to the side we see again how irrelevant is the homophobia of a man lost in prejudice and self-hatred, and how it changes when he becomes aware and when he learns to love.
The ancient rule in comedy, from the Greeks to Shakespeare to the musical comedy of the stage to the romantic comedies of the silver screen, has been young and attractive principals overcome obstacles and live happily ever after. Here we have obstacles of the most tiring sort, obstacles not of class or race or family, but of psychological problems, stuff straight out of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders--although to be technical, the symptoms of Melvin Udall are a cornucopia of psychiatric delight. The bitter, cutting, hateful insults that he showers on everyone, even his most devoted admirers, seem more characteristic of Tourette's Syndrome than of a obsessive compulsive disorder. But never mind. It works. In fact everything works in this movie, from the adorable little dog whom Melvin loves ("A dog...a blanky-blanky dog!" who has captured his heart he tells us in amazement), to Greg Kinnear's character's friend (Cuba Gooding) trying to act tough, to Shirley Knight in a bit part as Helen Hunt's character's mother, to the cute little boy with asthma.
However--and this is a big however--this movie is not for everybody, which accounts for some of the nasty reviews below. But ignore them. Trust me. This is a wonderful movie, although perhaps not for those who are homophobic or 13-years-old.