People drive past him as he tries to direct traffic. He thinks there's something fishy about the death, and sniffs out evidence for what may be a delusionary conspiracy involving crooked real estate developers and politicians. But no one respects the town drunk, not even when he wears a badge. Nolte continues to be tormented by his demon of a father. And Nolte's increasingly erratic behavior sours whatever store of tolerance he once possessed around town.
Affliction offers no happy endings and no neat answers.
It has no heroes. Even Dafoe's disengagement from his past smells like moral cowardice, a sin of omission rather than the violent old man's sins of commission. Affliction opens Friday at the Oriental.