One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest: 1975

If you're looking for an uplifting film, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is not a good option at all. Going into this film, I didn't really know much about the premise, and I'm not sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. If I wasn't doing this blog, I don't know if I would have finished watching this one.

The film isn't bad; actually, it's quite understandable why it won Best Picture. The acting is absolutely outstanding, but it's not Jack Nicholson who carries this. He seems more or less like the jerk he plays in As Good As It Gets and any other role where he's required to be arrogant and defiant. While the plot follows Nicholson's character McMurphy, it's the supporting characters who captivated me. Danny DeVito plays Martini, a man who suffers from some mental illness that makes him seem like a small child. In this scene, Martini is playing Monopoly with another patient and wants to put a hotel on Boardwalk even though he's not playing by the rules:

DeVito is so convincing, as are the other actors who play the residents of this hospital. I found myself way more interested in their stories than McMurphy. Part of that was due to McMurphy being so despicable, but another part of that was due to how the actors convinced me that these men were real and were suffering.

I won't recommend this film to people unless they are looking for a film with impressive acting and a grim although realistic portrayal of a mental hospital of the 1970s. While the acting is phenomenal, the story is depressing, and the staff of the hospital is cruel and holier than thou as they "treat" the patients in a setting that seems more like a prison than a treatment center.