Astute direction from Howard and two booming central performances elevate televisual material onto a new realm.

Rating: 7/10 (6 December 2009)

It's to Frost/Nixon's great credit that a series, or passage, of televised interviews from thirty or so years ago come across as cinematic as they do here. In a film whose requirements are to distribute a certain amount of dramatic weight to both the interviews themselves as well as to all the talking, planning and building in the lead up to the interviews, Frost/Nixon rather impressively balances the burden. Most of the scenes in the run up carry a strange, laid back and somewhat cheeky aura to them; driven by Michael Sheen's gleefully faced, easily excitable, 'the world is my oyster' journalist David Frost. There's nothing that the man doesn't think he cannot achieve; and the period setting, in which a lot of the mise-en-scene seems to boast somewhat proudly "this is the 1970s", mixed with a colourful palette creates an odd overall juxtaposition clashing with the fact it's Richard Nixon we're additionally dealing with here; and it's what he did that spawns what the film's essentially revolving around.
I'd say a lot of the film feels carefree, almost as if we're supposed to find a lot of what goes on quite funny, but I mean that with the greatest of respects. Out of the interview room, the universe in which the film is unfolded is Frost's and is captured dutifully by the above characteristics. When the cameras are rolling and the two men are sitting opposite one another, Frost initially seems lost: that sense of 'fun' dissipates and Nixon dominates a lot of the proceedings. The film is a clashing of two perspectives of the world and those that inhabit it: young with old; carefree with careful; colloquial with formal but in addition, that underlying essence of British with American.
The film begins with what looks like some sort of formal interview about tricky subject matter shot with a 'vox-pox' ideation in mind, very quickly setting up that sense of juxtaposition Frost/Nixon seems to maintain in regards to character attitudes and sense of atmosphere. Frequently using, but not overdoing, the docu-drama convention; the early dialogue to camera is a journalist talking about how he followed Nixon's gradual decline from The White House as president of the USA, before observing the finale to everything and how to him it all resembled a soap opera of sorts, as these incredible events played out to the world. The relation that the film makes here, towards how real life events are able to carry some sort of dramatic weight, is a further example of how Frost/Nixon's self-referential style and content believes in its subject material and invites you to dramatically enjoy it. This is both the talk and the build up to the interviews as well as the actual Frost-Nixon interviews themselves as a piece of cinematic drama.
Sheen is Frost, as mentioned, whilst Frank Langella is Nixon. Nixon is a big guy, both in name and stature. Frost is softly spoken in comparison, juddery and wide-eyed whereas Nixon's deep, gruff and somewhat slurred voice twinned with a supposed bottomless pit of knowledge, interests and life-stories has him as more than a match for this relatively small time London Weekend Television based TV presenter whose overall televisual genre, if we go by what Frost is seen presenting early on, seems to be a combination of both news and slapstick.
Most of the film is fun and games in regards to the build up to the first interview. Nixon establishes himself as the kind of man who subscribes to challenges, likes to set himself goals and enjoys battles with individuals, be they victories or otherwise. When Kevin Bacon's Jack Brennan, an aide to Nixon, begins to label it a boxing match – a sort of on screen verbal jousting, the notion of this being a close to one-off; one-on-one scenario between two contrasting individuals is really pushed home in case nobody's got it by now. The film's somewhat colourful and upbeat content prior to the sessions, helped by Frost's seemingly invincible confidence, establishes one sense of aura but everything gradually gets lowered down to a more grounded level when it's established money is an issue on Frost's behalf, something that will crop up later in in regards to loosing a lot of it as well as potentially one's career. There's that feeling that Frost, playing an up and coming television personality, whilst Nixon, as an on the way down politician, has a chance to bury him when they meet half way.
But Ron Howard's impressive direction puts pay to this, very gradually reiterating the money as an element which puts everything severely at stake. The reality of the situation is brought home when Frost is all alone in a darkened and gloomy hotel room on a Friday night prior to a days shooting – he doesn't have much to go on in terms of material, and his career is on the line: there's that interesting sense that the guy is beginning to realise what 'real' journalism is all about. But while encompassing elements of self-discovery for Frost, establishing a wrong belief and a wrong approach before having him correct himself, the film isn't necessarily dominated by this study. Rather, it sees a man grossly underestimate another man, much in the vein he did an entire nation with a very fair and very specific political system rendering the whole thing a success on careful and minute levels.