Frost/Nixon

Copyright 2008, Universal Pictures

I was recently talking with someone about a theory I'd heard and absolutely agree with: Ron Howard is not a director who has any kind of style or recognizable stamp. If you found someone who had no knowledge of Howard as a filmmaker, and had never seen Backdraft, or Apollo 13, or even A Beautiful Mind, would they know they were watching films directed by the same person? Ron Howard may be the best example of the journeyman director, except he's more famous (and has better taste in comedy; see Arrested Development). Aside from using his brother Clint in his movies, what is there of note in Howard's directing style?

Frost/Nixon, his newest film, is no different, though the movie certainly moves quicker and has more life in it than his last film, the execrable The Da Vinci Code. To be even fairer, aside from Apollo 13, this is probably Howard's best work as a director, or at least the best film involving him at all.

It does help that the film, based on the popular stage play by Peter Morgan (screenwriter of The Queen and The Last King of Scotland), has two powerful performances at the fore, that of Michael Sheen and Frank Langella, as David Frost and Richard Nixon. The basic story of the film is the dramatization of legendary interviews between Frost and Nixon in 1977, an attempt to get Nixon to admit wrongdoing for Watergate and other mistakes made during his somewhat shortened presidency. At the time of the interviews, though, David Frost was about as respected a political journalist as is Ryan Seacrest, and Richard Nixon, while being a crook, was also incredibly smart. So, for the majority of the interviews, Nixon runs circles around his questioner, until the final session on Watergate.

Unlike a similar year-end contender based on a play, Doubt, this film works by opening things up. This is not a hugely expansive film, but obviously it covers more ground than its stage version. Howard, at the very least, succeeds at not making things feel too stagy. Whatever issues the script has are mostly ignored thanks to those lead performances, and supporting turns by Kevin Bacon (as Nixon's right-hand man), Oliver Platt, Sam Rockwell, and Matthew Macfadyen (all playing Frost's researchers).

And, really, there's only one glaring problem with this movie, that holds it back from being a little more powerful: talking heads. I say this without knowing for sure if the same technique is employed in the play (though I do know that video screens are used on stage, at least for the interviews), but throughout the film, we see talking heads from the characters played by Bacon, Platt, Rockwell, and Macfadyen explaining things we are either about to see or have already seen. None of them add anything to the proceedings, aside from a sneaking suspicion that someone thinks we deserve to be condescended to.

Aside from that, why complain about a slickly made, entertaining production? Langella is certainly the memorable one here, with his outsize Nixon, especially in the final 30 minutes. It's Sheen, though, who's being incorrectly forgotten. Frost, for the most part, is the main character of this film, but Sheen is so subtle in his agony of presuming his career will end because of these interviews that it's hard not to notice him here.

Frost/Nixon is one of Ron Howard's best, and may end up as a Best Picture nominee, but don't be surprised if he's once again the victim of the famous Oscar slight, of having a Best Picture nominee without a nominated director. And, honestly, the only person he can blame is himself.

Three and a half stars out of four