The creator of the Simpsons tries his hand at movie making

Rating: 7/10 (7 October 2011)

This movie was directed by one of the creators of the Simpsons and it was his first movie. It is a movie about relationships: between the women that you love, and between those that you just cannot stand. It is about those of us who must have things go our own way and cannot stand it when things go against us. In a nut shell, as Good as it Gets is simply a damn good movie. This movie explores relationships. It is centred around a man who is obsessive compulsive. He must have everything go exactly as he wants it to. He sits in the same seat in the same restaurant for breakfast everyday and has the same waitress serve him. He has a homosexual neighbour who he cannot stand because he is not normal. Everything of going the way he wants it to until his neighbour is beaten up and sent to hospital and his favourite waitress can no longer go to work because of the fact that her son is very ill. Jack Nicholson is nothing less that brilliant in this movie. I relate to the character in a way because I know that I have an obsessive compulsive streak and it was amusing watching him and knowing that these traits one experiences. But deeper than that, there is a little of the Simpsons coming out in this movie, the way something that is in all of use is exaggerated to a point where it is absurd. The movie is focused around Jack Nicholson's character because it is he who are we supposed to relate to, not the homosexual nor the woman. His self-centered, self-righteous, rude nature is something that is in all of us. He can never complement and there are many times when we could give a complement but all we really do is insult them. We need to remember that things change and that people have lives of their own. We need to remember that people do need to be encouraged once in a while. The truth is, when we laugh at Jack Nicholson's character, we are really laughing at ourselves.