Unexpectedly Spellbinding and Full of Tension

Rating: Null/10 (25 January 2009)

On the face of it, a movie about a TV interview doesn't sound that exciting does it? But Frost/Nixon is utterly absorbing, I couldn't take my eyes off the screen. It's the second movie I've seen this week based on a stage play - the other was Doubt - and while such films rarely include much in the way of action or special effects, they do give actors something to really get their teeth into and often offer some of the year's best acting performances. And that's true of both Frost/Nixon and Doubt. I go to the movies (often) for lots of different reasons, sometimes for a bit of escapist fun, sometimes because I want to see a favorite actor, and sometimes to see great performances (getting all three at once is the Holy Grail of movie watching for me!) and Frost/Nixon definitely gave me some great performances to watch.
Michael Sheen plays David Frost, British TV personality, talk show host and public man about town. He may be new to the younger American audience, but as I'm a Brit (transplanted to the USA in middle age) he's been on the radar since my youth, famed for satirical TV shows That Was The Week That Was, The Frost Report, and a trademark "Hello, Good Evening and Welcome!" line. (My brother does a rather good impersonation of him.) In 1977 Frost  who was considered a journalistic lightweight- rather audaciously gained an interview with disgraced ex president Richard Nixon (Frank Langella), who had resigned after the Watergate scandal in 1974 rather than face impeachment. Nixon's successor Gerald Ford pardoned him of any wrongdoing that he might have committed so Nixon was never brought to trial, much to the regret of many Americans. Frost and his team of researchers wanted to give Nixon the trial on TV that he never had in court, while Nixon and his team of minders thought Frost would be a pushover, and that this might be a way for Tricky Dicky to reinvent himself and get back onto the political scene.
And Frost almost was a pushover according to this view, (which I think Frost himself has indicated is about 90% accurate.) He struggled to raise the money for the enterprise after the US networks refused to pony up to pay Nixon for the interviews (citing an aversion to check book journalism), and he allowed Nixon to dominate the early meetings. Nixon rambles on about less pressing issues, reciting tired anecdotes about Kissinger and Mao, evading the hard questions, while Frost's researchers and producer gnash their teeth and chew their knuckles with anxiety, the dollar signs burning before their eyes.
Frost had staked his personal wealth as well as his reputation on this encounter, and everything was pinned on the last interview session, where, finally, Nixon got as close as he ever got to an admission of guilt and made the classic statement that a crime isn't a crime if committed by the president. When finally shown on US TV, the interviews got huge audiences, the networks ate some humble pie and David Frost's reputation was made (and his bank account saved!) Director Ron Howard masterfully brings out the tension of that last bout, after which Nixon emerged semi bewildered to disappear back into the political wilderness until his death.
Brit Peter Morgan wrote the stage play and the screenplay. A great screenwriter, he also wrote The Queen, The Last King of Scotland and Longford, and I suspect he's one of the best writers around just now for nailing a character study. The cast includes Sam Rockwell (whom I last saw in the rather strange Choke), Kevin Bacon, Matthew Macfadyen (Mr Darcy opposite Keira Knightley in Pride and Prejudice), Oliver Platt, Toby Jones and a very decorative Rebecca Hall (seen to more effect in Vicky Christina Barcelona) as Caroline Cushing, Frost's girlfriend at the time.
Frank Langella has deservedly been Oscar nominated for his work in Frost/Nixon, and Michael Sheen is excellent too (although he's forever imprinted on this cynical Brit's mind as the ingratiating young Tony Blair in The Queen.)
A thoroughly worthy Oscar nominee. I'd love to see the stage play.