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Kicking back with Morgan and Jack You can win an Oscar and still not be very good; but (with the exception of Oliver Stone) it’s pretty hard to win three Oscars and not be all that good. Jack Nicholson has won three and, for as long as movie folks care to remember, that’s one of the reasons he always gets front row seats at the Oscars. The other reason? He’s a gifted actor. Morgan Freeman probably, privately, complains he’s sick of being typecast; though I can’t see too much downside when you’ve twice been cast in the role of God in major studio pictures. And he is an Oscar winning actor (and one of the good ones at that). Neither Morgan nor Jack has an expansive range of characters from which to draw on. However, within their respective ranges, both are gifted exponents of their chosen art. Clint Eastwood, famously opined in Magnum Force that, “a man’s got to know his limitations.” There’s nothing wrong with pushing the boundaries of your limits — that’s how Clint won his four Oscars; but a man's got to know his limitations. It’s a little more than coincidental that Morgan Freeman was in the cast for all of Clint’s Oscar wins. Now, Morgan and Jack finally grace the screen together in, the Rob Reiner directed, The Bucket List. And yes, they didn’t push their limits; but they did work within their personally far reaching boundaries. The Bucket List is as simple as the title suggests, two old guys are dying of cancer and they make a list of all the things they should have (or could have) done in their lives. And then, in their rapidly declining months, they do the list. Rob Reiner is a lot of things: prolific is not among them. Since the turn of the millennium he’s directed just three feature motion pictures. And, despite having celebrated his 61st birthday a couple of weeks ago, he’s only directed fifteen features in a career in the movie and TV business that spans five decades. Sure, his Dad Carl Reiner helped him get a start; but Rob, and his body of work, stand quite nicely on their own. In his fifteen directing gigs, his hit/miss ratio is heavily weighted on the hit side; and one might argue that in This is Spinal Tap, When Harry Met Sally and Stand By Me he directed three of the most iconic films of the 1980s. What’s more, three icons in three different genres. Okay, okay, okay… time to stop blowing smoke up his ass. Reiner did support that big idiot in the 2000 US Presidential Race (not Bush, the other idiot). As a concept The Bucket List has ‘wait for DVD’ written all over it. One could argue that this production, in its entirety, is simply a vehicle in which to get Morgan and Jack side-by-side on the big screen. And, pursuing this argument, one could be right. Foolishly, I caught the early review of an ‘erudite’ young film critic who’d complained of a weak script, predictable story line; and soft excuse for bringing Freeman and Nicholson together. His view? A cinematic disappointment. Then I got to thinking… This reviewer, who’s name I refuse to even to attempt recollect, was offering a grown up audience opinions on a film which (regardless of writing, acting or directing) essentially asks some pretty big questions about life. A few short years ago, when this kid showed up to review Russell Crowe’s Oscar winning performance in Gladiator they wouldn’t let him in. Why? Because he was still a teenager—Gladiator is an R rated film. So I was left asking myself the question, what does this kid know about life? Nothing. The two leads in The Bucket List are a worldly and wise man of limited economic means; and a self-centered, though charmingly cavalier, multiple divorcee of virtually unlimited economic means. Like I said before, Morgan and Jack were typecast; and if you need to ask who played which part then cinema is clearly not the entertainment medium best suited to you. A big number of items on the ‘bucket list’ fall under the category of overseas destinations. Conveniently, one of these guys owns a private jet, thus they travel to Europe, Africa (north and south), NOTE TO So The Bucket List is no Lawrence of Arabia but it’s still worth seeing. At one point Morgan Freeman argues that everybody should do something or another. Jack Nicholson snaps back, “I’m not everybody!” Late in the picture, Morgan tells Jack “I know you’re not everybody; but everybody is everybody.” I have a bucket list of sorts and I’d like to think I’m a good forty years away from kicking it. There’s one great person with whom I would share the most profound thoughts on my list; but he died of cancer in February 2002. I’ll have other sidekicks if I manage to reach the declining stages of old age; sadly my first bucket choice won’t be there. Perhaps this film means different things to me than it means to everybody else; but who is everybody? |
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