Five Easy Pieces | |
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![]() Theatrical release poster | |
Directed by | Bob Rafelson |
Screenplay by | Adrien Joyce |
Story by |
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Produced by |
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Starring | |
Cinematography | László Kovács |
Edited by |
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Production company | |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
Release dates |
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Running time | 98 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $1.6 million |
Box office | $18.1 million [1] |
Five Easy Pieces is a 1970 American drama film directed by Bob Rafelson, written by Carole Eastman (as Adrien Joyce) and Rafelson, and starring Jack Nicholson, Karen Black, Susan Anspach, Lois Smith, and Ralph Waite. The film tells the story of surly oil rig worker Bobby Dupea, whose rootless blue-collar existence belies his privileged youth as a piano prodigy. When Bobby learns that his father is dying, he travels to his family home in Washington to visit him, taking along his uncouth girlfriend.
The film was nominated for four Academy Awards and five Golden Globe Awards, and in 2000, was included in the annual selection of 25 motion pictures added to the United States National Film Registry of the Library of Congress being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and recommended for preservation. [2] [3]
Bobby Dupea works in an oil field in Kern County, California. He spends most of his time with his girlfriend Rayette, a waitress who has dreams of singing country music, or with his friend, fellow oil worker Elton, with whom he bowls, gets drunk, and philanders. While Bobby acts the part of a blue-collar laborer, he is secretly a former classical pianist who comes from an upper-class family of musicians.
When Bobby gets Rayette pregnant and Elton is arrested, Bobby quits his job and goes to Los Angeles, where his sister Partita, also a pianist, is making a recording. Partita tells him that their father, from whom Bobby is estranged, has suffered two strokes, and urges him to return to the family home in Washington.
Rayette threatens to kill herself if Bobby leaves her, so he reluctantly asks her along. Driving north, they pick up two stranded women headed for Alaska, Terry and Palm. The latter launches into a monologue about the evils of consumerism. The four are thrown out of a restaurant after Bobby gets into a sarcastic argument with an obstinate waitress who refuses to accommodate his request for toast.
Embarrassed by Rayette's lack of polish, Bobby registers her in a motel before driving alone to the family home on an island in Puget Sound. He finds Partita giving their father a haircut, and the old man seems completely oblivious to him. At dinner, Bobby meets Catherine Van Oost, a young pianist engaged to his amiable brother Carl, a violinist. Despite personality differences, Catherine and Bobby are immediately attracted to each other and later have sex in her room.
Rayette runs out of money at the motel and comes to the Dupea estate unannounced. Her presence creates an awkward situation, but when a pompous family friend, Samia Glavia, ridicules her, Bobby comes to her defense. Storming from the room in search of Catherine, he discovers his father's male nurse giving Partita a massage. He picks a fight with the very strong nurse, who easily subdues him.
Bobby tries to persuade Catherine to go away with him, but she declines, telling him he cannot ask for love when he does not love himself, or anything at all. After trying to talk to his unresponsive father, Bobby leaves with Rayette. Shortly into the trip they stop for gas. While Rayette's view is obstructed, Bobby abandons her, hitching a ride on a truck headed north.
While the film's earlier scenes were shot in California, the majority was filmed in the Pacific Northwest. [4] Filming primarily occurred on Vancouver Island in British Columbia, with additional photography occurring in Florence and Portland, Oregon. [5]
The film's diner sequence, in which Robert pesters an obstinate waitress, was filmed [6] at a Denny's [7] along Interstate 5 near Eugene, Oregon. [8] [9] Screenwriter Carole Eastman based the scene on a real incident she witnessed at Pupi's Bakery and Sidewalk Café, [10] [11] [12] [13] a Los Angeles diner, where an aggrieved Jack Nicholson pushed all the plates and cups off of a table. [14]
To prepare for his role, Jack Nicholson undertook piano lessons from Polish concert pianist Josef Pacholczyk. [15]
In 2022, Sally Struthers revealed that director Bob Rafelson coerced her into appearing nude on set, against her stated wishes, and made a false promise that she would not appear nude in the final cut. [16]
The opening credits list the five classical piano pieces played in the film and referenced in the title. Pearl Kaufman is credited as the pianist.
Also listed are four songs sung by Tammy Wynette: "Stand by Your Man", "D-I-V-O-R-C-E", "Don't Touch Me", and "When There's a Fire in Your Heart".
The film was shown at the New York Film Festival on September 11, 1970. It opened commercially on September 12 at the Coronet Theatre in New York. [17]
"The last sequence is of the finest quality. Bobby decides to leave both girlfriend and family and abandon life entirely...a truck driver gives him a ride to a place where 'it is very cold': the country of death. Rafelson and his cameraman László Kovács fix the scene in our minds forever: the filling station and its discreet restroom; the grey surrounding buildings; the dripping autumnal vegetation of the Pacific Northwest; the parked truck waiting to go to Alaska; the face of Nicholson, already aging and filled with premonitory shadows, fixed behind the windshield. Religion, love and family have all failed to work, leaving absolutely nothing at the end but a journey to nowhere."—Biographer Charles Higham in The Art of the American Cinema: 1900-1971. [18]
In its opening weekend at the Coronet (2 days), it grossed $10,476. [19] It grossed $36,710 in its first week. [20] After ten weeks of release, it reached number one at the US box office. [21]
The film earned $1.2 million in the United States in 1970. [22] By 1976 it had earned $8.9 million in the United States and Canada. [23]
The film opened to positive reviews. It holds an 89% rating on online review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, based on 55 reviews, with an average rating of 8.60/10. The critics' consensus states: "An important touchstone of the New Hollywood era, Five Easy Pieces is a haunting portrait of alienation that features one of Jack Nicholson's greatest performances." [24]
Roger Ebert gave the film four out of four stars, describing it as "one of the best American films", one that "becomes a masterpiece of heartbreaking intensity" as it develops its lead character's arc. Ebert called Bobby Dupea "one of the most unforgettable characters in American movies." [25] Ebert named the film the best of 1970, and later added it to his "Great Movies" series. [26]
John Simon criticized Five Easy Pieces for its pretentiousness and oversimplification but said if anything saved the film from triviality, it was the performances, especially those of Karen Black, Lois Smith, and Billy Green Bush. [27]
In 2022 retrospective review, Polish writer Jacek Szafranowicz called the film "one of the masterpieces of the New Hollywood era", concluding that it is "flawless". [28]
On November 16, 1999, Columbia TriStar Home Video released the film on two-sided DVD-Video, featuring both fullscreen (4:3) and widescreen formats. [37]
Grover Crisp of Sony Pictures conducted a 4K restoration of the film, and it was screening theatrically in DCP by 2012. [38] [39]
The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray by The Criterion Collection in November 2010 as part of the box set America Lost and Found: The BBS Story. It includes audio commentary featuring director Bob Rafelson and interior designer Toby Rafelson (originally recorded for a Criterion laserdisc); Soul Searching in "Five Easy Pieces", a 2009 video piece with Rafelson; BBStory, a 2009 documentary about the BBS era, with Rafelson, actors Jack Nicholson, Karen Black, and Ellen Burstyn, and directors Peter Bogdanovich and Henry Jaglom, among others; and audio excerpts from a 1976 AFI interview with Rafelson. [40]
On June 30, 2015, Five Easy Pieces was released as a stand-alone DVD and Blu-ray by the Criterion Collection. [41]
On the Waterfront is a 1954 American crime drama film, directed by Elia Kazan and written by Budd Schulberg. It stars Marlon Brando, and features Karl Malden, Lee J. Cobb, Rod Steiger, Pat Henning and Eva Marie Saint in her film debut. The musical score was composed by Leonard Bernstein. The black-and-white film was inspired by "Crime on the Waterfront" by Malcolm Johnson, a series of articles published in November–December 1948 in the New York Sun which won the 1949 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting, but the screenplay by Budd Schulberg is directly based on his own original story. The film focuses on union violence and corruption among longshoremen, while detailing widespread corruption, extortion, and racketeering on the waterfronts of Hoboken, New Jersey.
Easy Rider is a 1969 American independent road drama film written by Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, and Terry Southern, produced by Fonda, and directed by Hopper. Fonda and Hopper play two bikers who travel through the American Southwest and South, carrying the proceeds from a cocaine deal. The success of Easy Rider helped spark the New Hollywood era of filmmaking during the early 1970s.
The Last Picture Show is a 1971 American coming-of-age drama film directed and co-written by Peter Bogdanovich, adapted from the semi-autobiographical 1966 novel The Last Picture Show by Larry McMurtry. The film's ensemble cast includes Timothy Bottoms, Jeff Bridges, Ellen Burstyn, Ben Johnson, Cloris Leachman, and Cybill Shepherd. Set in a small town in northern Texas from November 1951 to October 1952, it is a story of two high-school seniors and long-time friends, Sonny Crawford (Bottoms) and Duane Jackson (Bridges).
Broadcast News is a 1987 American romantic comedy-drama film written, produced and directed by James L. Brooks. The film concerns a virtuoso television news producer who has daily emotional breakdowns, a brilliant yet prickly reporter, and the latter's charismatic but far less seasoned rival. It also stars Robert Prosky, Lois Chiles, Joan Cusack, and Jack Nicholson.
As Good as It Gets is a 1997 American romantic comedy-drama film directed by James L. Brooks from a screenplay he co-wrote with Mark Andrus. It stars Jack Nicholson as a misanthropic, bigoted and obsessive–compulsive novelist, Helen Hunt as a single mother with a chronically ill son, and Greg Kinnear as a gay artist. The film premiered at the Regency Village Theatre on December 6, 1997, and was released theatrically in the United States on December 25, 1997, and was a critical and box office hit, grossing $314.1 million on a $50 million budget.
Head is a 1968 American satirical musical adventure film written and produced by Jack Nicholson and Bob Rafelson, directed by Rafelson, starring television rock group the Monkees and distributed by Columbia Pictures. A theatrical spin-off of the 1966–68 NBC television show and a swan song, it started production directly after completion of series production.
Blood and Wine is a 1996 American neo-noir crime thriller film directed by Bob Rafelson and starring Jack Nicholson, Stephen Dorff, Jennifer Lopez, Judy Davis, and Michael Caine. The screenplay was written by Nick Villiers and Alison Cross. Rafelson has stated that the film forms the final part of his unofficial trilogy with Nicholson, with whom he made Five Easy Pieces and The King of Marvin Gardens in the 1970s.
The King of Marvin Gardens is a 1972 American drama film. It stars Jack Nicholson, Bruce Dern, Ellen Burstyn and Scatman Crothers. It is one of several collaborations between Nicholson and director Bob Rafelson. The majority of the film is set in a wintry Atlantic City, New Jersey, with cinematography by László Kovács.
Susan Florence Anspach was an American stage, film and television actress who had roles in films during the 1970s and 1980s such as Five Easy Pieces (1970), Play It Again, Sam (1972), Blume in Love (1973), Montenegro (1981), Blue Monkey (1987), and Blood Red (1989).
Berton "Bert" Jerome Schneider was an American film and television producer.
Raybert Productions was a production company that operated in the 1960s, founded by Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider. Its principal works were the situation comedy The Monkees, and the 1969 movie Easy Rider. Raybert was also the predecessor to BBS Productions, a New Hollywood production company founded by Rafelson, Schneider, and Schneider's childhood friend Stephen Blauner. BBS Productions' best known film is The Last Picture Show.
Robert Jay Rafelson was an American film director, writer and producer. He is regarded as one of the key figures in the founding of the New Hollywood movement of the 1970s. Among his best-known films as a director include those made as part of the company he co-founded, Raybert/BBS Productions, Five Easy Pieces (1970) and The King of Marvin Gardens (1972) as well as acclaimed later films, The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981) and Mountains of the Moon (1990). Other films he produced as part of BBS include two of the most significant films of the era, Easy Rider (1969) and The Last Picture Show (1971). Easy Rider, Five Easy Pieces and The Last Picture Show were all chosen for inclusion in the Library of Congress' National Film Registry. He was also one of the creators of the pop group and TV series The Monkees with BBS partner Bert Schneider. His first wife was the production designer Toby Carr Rafelson.
A Safe Place is a 1971 American drama film written and directed by Henry Jaglom and starring Tuesday Weld, Orson Welles, and Jack Nicholson.
Man Trouble is a 1992 American romantic black comedy film starring Jack Nicholson and Ellen Barkin. It was directed by Bob Rafelson and written by Carole Eastman, who together had been responsible for 1970's Five Easy Pieces.
The 36th New York Film Critics Circle Awards, honored the best filmmaking of 1970.
Drive, He Said is a 1971 American independent film directed by Jack Nicholson, in his directorial debut, and starring William Tepper, Karen Black, Bruce Dern, Robert Towne and Henry Jaglom. Based on the 1964 novel of the same name by Jeremy Larner, the film follows a disenchanted college basketball player who is having an affair with a professor's wife, as well as dealing with his counterculture roommate's preoccupation with avoiding the draft in the Vietnam War. The film features supporting performances by David Ogden Stiers, Cindy Williams, and Michael Warren. The screenplay was adapted by Larner and Nicholson, and included uncredited contributions from Terrence Malick.
John Joseph Nicholson is a retired American actor and filmmaker. Nicholson is widely regarded as one of the greatest actors of the 20th century. Throughout his five-decade career he received numerous accolades, including three Academy Awards, three BAFTA Film Awards, six Golden Globe Awards, and a Grammy Award. He also received the American Film Institute's Life Achievement Award in 1994 and the Kennedy Center Honor in 2001. In many of his films, he played rebels against the social structure.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is a 1975 American psychological drama film directed by Miloš Forman, based on the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey. The film stars Jack Nicholson as a new patient at a mental institution, alongside Louise Fletcher as a sadistic nurse. The supporting cast is Will Sampson, Danny DeVito, Sydney Lassick, William Redfield, and the film debuts of Christopher Lloyd and Brad Dourif.
Helena Kallianiotes is a Greek-American film actress. In 1973, she was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture for her role as Jackie Burdette in Kansas City Bomber.
Jack Nicholson is an American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter who made his film debut in The Cry Baby Killer (1958). Nicholson is widely regarded as one of the greatest actors of his generation. He is also one of the most critically acclaimed: his 12 Academy Award nominations make him the most nominated male actor in the Academy's history. He is also a Kennedy Center Honoree and a recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award and the Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award.
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