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Movies / On DVD / Five Easy Pieces
Five Easy Pieces

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Five Easy Pieces (1970)

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81 %
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Reviews Counted:27

Fresh:22

Rotten:5

Average Rating:8.1/10

Runtime: 1 hr 38 mins

Genre: Dramas

Synopsis: FIVE EASY PIECES is one of the most notable collaborations between Jack Nicholson and director Bob Rafelson, with Nicholson in an outstanding performance as Bobby Dupea. In the film, Rafelson and... FIVE EASY PIECES is one of the most notable collaborations between Jack Nicholson and director Bob Rafelson, with Nicholson in an outstanding performance as Bobby Dupea. In the film, Rafelson and Nicholson capture the difficult, awkward life of a gifted man who hasn't discovered a way to fully express his talent or found his place in the world--and maybe never will. Bobby is a classic misfit--disillusioned about being a musician, unhappy as an oil rigger, and unable to make a commitment to his girlfriend, Rayette, who hopes for marriage. When he visits his family home on Puget Sound after a long absence, things don't get better. Bobby hates the repressive atmosphere: his brother is unbearable, his father can't speak, and his sister is involved with his father's supercilious male nurse. When Bobby sets his sights on his brother's fiancée, Catherine Van Ost (movingly played by the beautiful Susan Anspach), things seem to be getting better--that is, until Rayette arrives and Bobby realizes he is caught in a collision between his two lives. The film features characteristically gorgeous cinematography from Laszlo Kovaks and a soundtrack that skillfully offsets Tammy Wynette with Chopin. FIVE EASY PIECES is a riveting American story about a former musical ingénue whose gift becomes a burden to him as he grapples with the implications of his choices in work, relationships, and family. [More]

Starring: Jack Nicholson, Karen Black, Susan Anspach, Sally Struthers

Starring: Jack Nicholson, Karen Black, Susan Anspach, Sally Struthers, Billy "Green" Bush, Fannie Flagg, Marlena MacGuire, Richard Stahl, Lois Smith, Helena Kallianiotes, Toni Basil, John Ryan, Lorna Thayer, Ralph Waite, William Challee, Irene Dailey

Director: Bob Rafelson

Director: Bob Rafelson
Screenwriter: Bob Rafelson, Adrien Joyce
Producer: Richard Wechsler

[See More Credits]

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Release:

Dec 14, 1999

No Details Exist
 
 

Reviews for Five Easy Pieces

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1 - 20 (sorted by date)
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A key American film of its era, Bob Rafelson's moody, character-driven tale of an upper-middle class dropout established Jack Nicholson as the foremost actor of his generation in articulating the values of the new generation.

Full Review Source: EmanuelLevy.Com | comment Comment
02/26/08
Emanuel Levy
Emanuel Levy
EmanuelLevy.Com

Bobby can be seen as spiritual descendant of Melville's scrivener Bartleby, preferring not to participate in a world to which he doesn't subscribe.

Full Review Source: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette | comment Comment
12/07/07
Philip Martin
Philip Martin
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

Jack Nicholson shines in the film that helped cement his reputation as one of the finest actors of his generation.

Full Review Source: Channel 4 Film | comment Comment
07/26/07
Channel 4 Film

This episodic character study is one of the key American films of its era.

Full Review Source: TV Guide's Movie Guide | comment Comment
07/26/07
TV Guide's Movie Guide

The film's nervewracking quality is consistent with its content. Nicholson's performance is a remarkably varied and daring exploration of a complex character, equally convincing in its manic and sober aspects.

Full Review Source: Variety | comment Comment
07/26/07
Variety Staff
Variety Staff
Variety
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The film embraces proletarian chic but still gets its laughs by abusing waitresses.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
07/26/07
Dave Kehr
Dave Kehr
Chicago Reader
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Just give the guy a piece of toast.

Full Review Source: Arizona Daily Star | comment Comment
03/18/07
Phil Villarreal
Phil Villarreal
Arizona Daily Star

No review available.

comment Comment
04/06/06
Cole Smithey
Cole Smithey
ColeSmithey.com

The result is less a story and more a collection of incidents and character studies, all of which inform each other and extend our understanding of Nicholson's mode of survival: flight.

Full Review Source: Time Out | comment Comment
01/26/06
Time Out

No review available.

comment Comment
09/27/05
Chuck O'Leary
Chuck O'Leary
Fantastica Daily

No review available.

comment Comment
09/23/05
Michael Szymanski
Michael Szymanski
International Press Academy

Hold that sandwich! A film representing its time, and a classic.

comment Comment
10/15/04
Steve Crum
Steve Crum
Kansas City Kansan

It hasn't aged as well as some of its 1970s counterparts, but it's still a heartbreaking film and a minor classic.

Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid | comment Comment
06/21/04
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Combustible Celluloid

No review available.

comment Comment
01/12/04
Bill Chambers
Bill Chambers
Film Freak Central

No review available.

comment Comment
11/22/03
Mark Palermo
Mark Palermo
Coast (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

No review available.

comment Comment
10/03/03
Carol Cling
Carol Cling
Las Vegas Review-Journal

Rafelson is expert at supporting this movement, and the film proceeds from scene to scene with a quiet competent modernism that bespeaks quality, but that more often begs than provides expression.

Full Review Source: New York Times | comment Comment
05/21/03
Roger Greenspun
Roger Greenspun
New York Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

I expected a lot more from this film. It's basically a rambling boredom piece.

comment Comment
04/30/03
Alex Sandell
Alex Sandell
Juicy Cerebellum

We'd had a revelation. This was the direction American movies should take: Into idiosyncratic characters, into dialogue with an ear for the vulgar and the literate, into a plot free to surprise us about the characters, into an existential ending.

Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | comment Comment
03/25/03
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Chicago Sun-Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Nicholson at his angry, young man peak. Cynical, anti-authoritarian drama.

comment Comment
03/21/03
Bob Bloom
Bob Bloom
Journal and Courier (Lafayette, IN)
 
 
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