FIVE EASY PIECES (1970) Starring: Jack Nicholson, Karen Black,
Susan Anspach, Ralph Waite and Sally Struthers. Directed by Bob Rafelson. Screenplay
by Adrien Joyce Based on s Story by Adrien Joyce and Bob Rafelson. Produced by Bob
Rafelson, Richard Wechster. Run Time: 96 minutes. Color. U.S. Drama.
Sometimes when you look back on an older film,
especially one that earned a lot of praise and award nominations at the time of
its release, you wonder what all the fuss was about. When Five Easy Pieces was
released in 1970, Rafelson, the man behind the Monkees TV show, and Nicholson,
who co-wrote that same group’s mystifying film, Head (1969), were both in
demand. Nicholson had received attention the year before in a supporting role
in Dennis Hopper’s Easy Rider, but now he was the leading man. While Rafelson’s
career as a director would be somewhat spotty, Nicholson, who had been acting
in films since the end of the 50’s, would go on to become a rich icon of
Hollywood power and excess.
But watching the film over forty years later, one
wonders what all the fuss was about. The film, which garnered nominations for
Best Picture, Best Screenplay, Best Actor and Best Supporting Actress,
thankfully did not win any of these awards. I can see why the film would have
gotten attention at the time. While this is a linear narrative, it is also less
a whole story than a series of sketches about a man who seems discontent for no
real good reason other than he can’t deal with himself. He takes it out on
everyone around him, in one way or another.
At the same time, the film spends too much time
on the trivial scenes that don’t really move the story forward and doesn’t
really come to any real conclusion. For a film that is only a little over an
hour and a half it drags in places. We never really get inside our characters
and the relationships the film sets up seems unrealistic.
Five Easy Pieces tells the story of Robert “Bobby”
Eroica Dupea (Nicholson), a California oil field worker who is a classically-trained
pianist and from a family of musicians. But that comes out later in the film.
In the beginning, we see Bobby working in the fields with his friend Elton
(Billy “Green” Bush), who has a laugh that gets on your nerves pretty quickly.
Then Bobby goes home to his live-in girlfriend, Rayette Dipesto (Karen Black), a
waitress with whom he has little in common with, he dislikes her music, or
little respect for. The two of them go bowling with Elton and his wife Stoney
(Fannie Flagg) and argue throughout because Rayette is not much of a bowler.
 |
| Robert (Jack Nicholson) working in the oil fields. |
Afterwards, while Rayette waits in the car, Bobby starts up a conversation with
two girls from the next lane, Betty (Sally Ann Struthers, better known as Sally
Struthers from All in the Family fame) and Twinky (Marlene MacGuire). Betty and
Twinky mistake him for a TV announcer and Bobby does little to persuade them
otherwise.
Between scenes of work, in which we’re led to
believe Robert and Elton are old friends, and scenes of domesticity with Elton’s
and Stoney’s child, we see Bobby and Elton sitting around with Betty and Twinky
in someone’s living room drinking. Betty and Twinky are down to their bras and
we hear Betty talk about some anecdotal event in her life that she feels
compelled to share at that moment, though it has nothing to do with the scene
or resonates with the rest of the movie.
 |
Betty tells a story no one really cares about.
|
When Bobby and Elton show up drunk to
work, they are sent home, which leaves them stuck in morning rush hour traffic
on their way back into town. Restless, Bobby gets out of the car and eventually
climbs into the bed of a truck with a piano in it. Bobby starts to play Chopin’s
Fantasy in F minor and gets so carried away that he doesn’t notice that when
the traffic starts moving the truck takes off in a different direction. But
somehow, Bobby ends up back in town and at the diner where Rayette is working.
 |
| Bobby Dupea plays Chopin's Fantasy in F minor during a traffic jam. |
Bobby sort of finds out that Rayette is pregnant
from Elton, though nothing is ever really talked about her condition for the
rest of the film. Bobby reacts to the news by pushing Elton away and then
quitting his job at the oil field. The second after he does, Elton gets
arrested for a gas station robbery a year before that he has neglected to tell
Bobby about. (So much for being old friends.) Immediately, it seems Bobby heads
for Los Angeles. No reason is given, but he knows that his sister, Partita
(Lois Smith), also a pianist, is making a recording there. Partita informs Bobby
that their father, Nicholas (William Challee), has suffered a series of strokes.
Bobby agrees to visit him on Puget Sound in Washington state. Next, we see Bobby
having sex with Betty before going back to Rayette. Again no reason is given
for the scene, but it just underlines what a rat Bobby is to Rayette. He packs
a bag, just suits and shirts, and starts to leave. Obviously, though, Rayette
has gotten under his skin, because before he drives away he gets mad at himself
and goes back to ask her along.
On the way, they pick up two women, who are
referred to in other synopses about the film as lesbians, Palm Apodaca (Helena
Kallianiotes) and Terry Grouse (Toni Basil). Apparently, their car broke down
and they force themselves on Bobby and Rayette. For a man that has little time
for the rest of the world, the fact he lets them come along is a bit of a
surprise and out of character. The two women are headed for Alaska, because
Palm thinks there won’t be as much filth there. Palm literally talks so much
Rayette and Terry fall asleep (and so could the audience).
 |
| Pot calling the kettle black. Cigarette smoking Palm lectures the car about filth |
This sequence goes
on longer than was needed, if it was needed at all. The only purpose seems to
set up the film’s most famous scene in which Bobby gets into a discussion about
substitutions on the menu with a waitress (Lorna Thayer), involving wheat toast
and chicken salad. Needless to say, Bobby’s solution gets the four kicked out.
After more talk about filth, Palm and Terry are dropped off. It is not made
clear if Bobby has tired of them or if this is the place they wanted to get
dropped off. This lack of motivation is a hallmark of the movie.
 |
| Most memorable scene in the movie. "I want you to put it between your knees." |
Instead of taking Rayette home with him, Bobby
sets her up in a motel with the promise to try to call her in a couple of days.
It seems left to Rayette to decide how long she wants to wait and what she’ll
do when she gets tired of waiting. When Bobby goes to his family home he meets
Catherine Van Oost (Susan Anspach), a pianist, the fiancée of his brother, Carl
Fidelio Dupea (Ralph Waite), a violinist, who has suffered a freak accident and
has a permanently strained neck. Nicholas is an emotionless blob being cared
for by a male nurse, Spicer (John Ryan). Over dinner, Bobby is attracted to
Catherine and later tries to find some time they can be alone. She tells him she’ll
be free when Carl goes into the mainland for treatment.
Before he goes to catch the ferry, Carl and Bobby,
with Partita watching, play a game of ping pong. The purpose of this seems to
be that Bobby can belittle Carl and feel better about his wanting to bed
Catherine. Catherine asks Bobby to play something for her and he plays what he
claims to be the easiest piece he knows, Chopin’s Prelude in E minor. While
Catherine at first scorns him for his lack of feeling, she nevertheless sleeps
with him and wants to sleep with him again while Carl is away.
 |
| Catherine (Susan Anspach) doesn't really like Bobby, but she's just about to sleep with him. |
Rayette, after two weeks, gets bored at the
motel and goes to the Dupea house unannounced. Her presence creates an awkward
situation. Bobby, as is his way, runs away, only to return, crossing paths with
Catherine who is on her way to pick up some friends. The most annoying friend
turns out to be Samia Glavia (Irene Dailey), who talks in esoteric terms about
everything and belittles Rayette about the latter’s love of television. But Bobby
defends Rayette and lashes out at Samia for being a pompous ass. Storming from
the room, Bobby goes looking for Catherine, instead finding his half-naked
sister Partita getting a massage from Spicer. Angry now without cause, Bobby
picks a senseless fight with Spicer, who easily overpowers him.
Bobby tries to convince Catherine to run away
with him, but she refuses, telling him that she cannot because he doesn’t love
himself and can’t expect love in return. In what is the closest thing to a
climax Bobby tries to talk to his father. He tells him that he runs away from
life when things get bad so that they don’t get worse. Seeing how Nicholas is
comatose, he doesn’t respond. Frustrated, Bobby leaves with Rayette and heads
back home. When they stop at a gas station, Rayette goes to get coffee at the
diner next door. While she’s gone, Bobby abandons her, hitching a ride on a
truck for Alaska while she’s inside. We watch as the truck drives off and
Rayette goes looking for him.
 |
Bobby tries to have a heart to heart with his father, Nicholas.
|
Praised at the time of its release as the future
of Hollywood films, thankfully that has not proven to be the case. I don’t have
a problem with stories that meander since sometimes the journey is the best
part of the adventure, but this is a film full of unsympathetic characters that
ultimately ends without any sort of resolution. While these sorts of films make
for great fodder in film critical studies classes, they are not really all that
entertaining or ultimately enlightening. This is an esoteric joyride, which is
to say there is no joy at all.
Five Easy Pieces came out at the time when the
anti-hero was emerging in Hollywood. The anti-hero is a protagonist without
qualities we usually expect in the hero: morally good, idealistic, courageous,
noble, etc. Under the production code, Hollywood had been forced to make films
about upstanding people, so when the code went away, films could explore the
darker side of the human equation. But all that doesn’t mean that the anti-hero
can’t also be sympathetic. If we’re supposed to invest our time in a character,
there should be some way for us to connect with him. Even Clyde Barrow in
Bonnie and Clyde (1967) were portrayed as a victim of his circumstances and with
some redeeming quality.
But Bobby has none and as an audience we’re not
given any reason to care or root for him. He is a misogynistic self-absorbed
ass, with talent, that he’s squandered. He cannot fit in with the intellectual
world of his family nor can he make a place for himself in the blue-collar
world of the California oil-fields.
Rayette is too dumb for words and cannot see
that Bobby doesn’t care for her only that he puts up with her when it suits
him. She is the puppy he kicks, but expects to lick his face when he wants
attention. Catherine doesn’t love Bobby but sleeps with him anyway. Afterward,
she can’t tell him enough about what a great man his brother Carl is and how
good he’s been to her. What a prize she turns out to be.
 |
Rayette (Karen Black) is too dumb for words in Five Easy Pieces.
|
Jack Nicholson is really good at playing Bobby.
And except for squandering his talent, you have to think there is something of
Nicholson in the character. To list all the films Nicholson has been in would
take pages. He is a great success at playing misfits and outsiders and is good
in lead roles as well as playing supporting characters. He has thrice won the
Academy Award for acting, twice as Best Actor in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s
Nest (1975) and As Good As it Gets (1997). He won for Best Supporting Actor in
Terms Of Endearment (1983). While his
career has slowed down as of late, his last film was James L. Brook’s How Do
You Know (2010), he can afford to rest on his acting laurels if he so chooses.
Rafelson, who would team up again with Nicholson
for a somewhat similar story, The King of Marvin Gardens (1972), would see his
career get derailed by the popularity of such films as Jaws (1976) and Star
Wars (1977), in which tastes shifted to spectacle and special effects. Rafelson’s
films didn’t seem to fit in as studios shifted their attention from small films
to ones that were supposed to hit home runs financially. He only made two more
films in the ’70s, King of Marvin Gardens and Stay Hungry (1976). In 1981, he
re-teamed with Nicholson in a failed remake of the classic The Postman Always
Rings Twice. (Note: don’t remake good films.) The last film he directed was No
Good Deed (2002).
The title of Five Easy Pieces refers to five
simple pieces that are a primer for piano players: Frederic Chopin’s Fantasy in
F minor; Johann Sebastian Bach’s Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue; Wolfgang Amadeus
Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 9 in E-flat Major; Chopin’s Prelude in E minor; and
Mozart’s Fantasy in D minor. All of which get played in the film.
After watching this film again, I cannot
recommend it. There are some interesting moments, some gems of dialogue, but they
are too few and far between to make Five Easy Pieces worthwhile. This is a film
whose big statement is to make no statement at all.
