User reviews

In an overall solid cast, Anthony Hopkins shines in a powerful performance as Richard Nixon in this Oliver Stone film tracing the former president's life from his boyhood in California to his resignation as U.S. President in 1974.

Nixon is seen as a troubled figure, insecure and paranoid, with few friends. An unhappy childhood, in which he refers to himself as his mother's "faithful dog," in fact does dog him his whole life, as he seeks to please a demanding ultra-religious mother (Mary Steenburgen)who had already died by the time he took office as President, but whose memory and expectations lived on. Nixon is burdened with an unhappy marriage to Pat (Joan Allen) - unhappy largely because of his own obsession with political success - and haunted by the ghost of John Kennedy, who defeated him for the presidency in 1960 and who Nixon could never live up to. Kennedy was loved; Nixon was hated - he could never get over that. A scene near the end of the movie demonstrates his feelings toward JFK as he looks at Kennedy's White House portrait: "They look at you and see what they want to be; they look at me and see who they are."

Although the movie - as any review of Nixon's life will - revolves around Watergate, it provides a fascinating summary of his life, and of what added up to make him the troubled and lonely figure he really was. There's also typical Oliver Stone material as dark hints of conspiracy extending far beyond Watergate are inserted. Perhaps the most unsettling being a meeting Nixon has shortly before JFK's assassination with some supporters in Texas who are trying to convince him to run for the presidency again in 1964. Nixon protests that Kennedy can't be beaten in '64. A Cuban American present says ominously "What if Kennedy doesn't run in '64?"

A truly fascinating portrayal of a fascinating man, even in the end somewhat sympathetic to Nixon as the film ends with his 1994 funeral service, some comments at that service by President Clinton and a summary of his career by a narrator pointing out his accomplishments. A last note: kudos to Paul Sorvino, who hit Henry Kissinger bang on.

8/10

Oliver Stone has a way of making films that grab you and hold you until the final frame. His films are usually controversial and that's what generates much debate and Nixon is no exception. Anthony Hopkins assumes the mantle of Richard M. Nixon and he does it with style. His Nixon is a complex man, full of ambition and dreams, but also filled with demons. Nixon lives in the shadow of JFK, and because of that, he feels he can never live up to the greatness that he aspires to. Joan Allen is equally convincing as Pat Nixon. She is a strong woman who loves her husband, but unlike Nixon, she grows tired of the political world. The film works best when we see the inner workings of the Nixon Whitehouse. We see the coverup of the Watergate break in. We see Nixon's historic visit to China and we see the final farewell of a flawed, but ambitious man. It's hard to cram an entire lifetime into a three hour film, but Stone manages to do it well. We get brief glimpses into Nixon's past and we see the events that eventually undid him. Some may say that Nixon is painted in an unfair light. I think Stone actually sympathizes with him. Here was a man who came into power in the middle of a war. He was feared by many and misunderstood by all. Nixon was able to rise above it all for a short period of time, and in that brief period, he did have the world.

Richard Nixon is one of the most controversial heads of state of the twentieth century. During his tenure as president of the United States, he earned a general hatred almost as high as the power and influence of his office. He was investigated, vilified, attacked but never condemned. Even though I'm not an American nor an expert of these period, I feel it is necessary to make an unbiased and objective historical analysis of this president, I just don't know if that has already happened. Even so, the film we have here didn't seem partial, trying to remain neutral to some extent.

Directed by Oliver Stone, it's not appropriate for people who don't know anything about Nixon, or Watergate, or this period of American history, since the film wasn't wasting time explaining anything. So if you didn't understand why Nixon opened the US to China or what was the Watergate or the Bay of Pigs, I suggest you ignore the movie for now and first go read some books or see some documentaries about it. Another problem I want to highlight is the huge web of conspiracies and obscure theories that the film weaves around the president. It never lets us understand what "crimes of responsibility" Nixon has committed. The film also suggests, without subtleties, that Nixon was a simple man who rose in life but wasn't accepted by the "American aristocracy" because of this humble origin, which left him deeply hurt. I don't know if it's true, but the film indicates that as origin of President's lack of scruples.

Anthony Hopkins assures the main role in an interesting performance, but that's far from being his best. He made a good preparation and tried his best to be Nixon, but has few physical similarities with him, not to mention his extreme difficulty in imitating president's characteristic voice. Anyway, Hopkins was brilliant at his character's psychological work, with most dramatic scenes going on as he, semi-drunk, reviews his decisions while listening to his famous audio tapes. The remaining cast does a reasonable supporting work. I will not close my review without left a word of appreciation to the sets and costumes, which rebuilt the atmosphere and culture of the Seventies quite well, much like the rooms and offices within White House. Not being exceptional, it's an elegant, quality film, that helps us think about an important period in American history.

Watergate hardly gets a mention in this film. We see the 'plumbers' donning rubber gloves, and the president fumbling with a few of his tapes, but detail is almost totally eschewed. There is no Egil Krogh, no Jeb Magruder. Kleindienst and Gray are mentioned only in passing. Cox is fired by way of a spoken TV bulletin, Jaworski is not referred to at all. We do not see anything of the titanic courtroom struggles, with all three branches of the federal government locking horns. Though we are told that the American Constitution is self-righting, like a boat immune from capsize, we are not shown how or why.

And in this, Oliver Stone is perfectly right. As it stands, the film is very long, and dense with detail. There is no room for the minutiae of the cover-up, which in any event would make for a confusing narrative. Stone's subject is Nixon the man, not the edifice that toppled around him.

And what a man. Richard Milhous Nixon is a truly fascinating personality - both statesman and charlatan: ruthless and vulnerable: unable to express his emotions, yet the most emotional of politicians: a man who spent his life in the law and in high office, but who never absorbed the legal and ethical mores of public life. Genius and crook, bold visionary and spiteful backstabber, Nixon will continue to spellbind biographers for decades to come.

"That's when it starts," says Stone's Nixon, "when you're a kid." The film takes us to Whittier, California in 1925 to see the unloved boy who struggled painfully to earn his parents' approval, without ever quite succeeding. As a teenager, he levered his way into the school football squad by sheer willpower. Lacking talent, he doggedly subjected himself to repeated physical battering in the scrimmages, "a tackle dummy with guts". This syndrome recurs throughout his career. Always susceptible to scathing criticism, never quite commanding respect, Nixon never the less kept ploughing back into the melee when wiser, lesser men would have quit. It is hardly surprising that the years of punishment should have left psychological scars.

Nixon's hatred of John Kennedy had more than one source. He was devastated by the defeat in the 1960 presidential election, but not simply because of disappointment at losing, or even because the Kennedy victory carried the odour of fraud: bitterest of all for Nixon was the realisation that the Kennedy people had played hardball more effectively than the Republicans. Nixon had been out-sharked, and it hurt. On a more profound level still, John Kennedy was everything that Nixon could never be. He was a smooth, handsome prince among men, exuding poise and confidence, a patrician imbued with the habit of authority. To Nixon, the perpetual outsider, the quaker geek who looked shoddy and disreputable, Kennedy seemed to have the dice unfairly loaded in his favour. JFK was an East Coast bright boy and war hero, fabulously wealthy and impeccably well-connected. Nixon owned nothing and knew nobody, and was all too obviously 'on the make'. The great witch-hunts, of Hiss in the 1940's and Ellsberg in the 1970's, are manifestations of the chip on Nixon's shoulder, the fathomless bile that he directed at East Coast college boys.

Nixon always imagined that he was hiding his pain from the world, whereas in fact it was on global display. His nervous little laugh at moments of emotional crisis was so false, so gut-wrenchingly inappropriate, that the onlooker could catch a glimpse of the man's tortured soul. Hopkins captures the wretched laugh with devastating effectiveness, both in the scene where Nixon is confronted by a hostile man in the TV studio audience, and when he solemnly promises that none of the president's men will go to jail. In the "Checkers" broadcast and the presidential TV address on Watergate, Nixon tries to assure the camera that he is not a crook, and on both occasions he has the exact opposite effect, confirming to the viewer that that is precisely what he is. Nixon seems incapable of examining his own conscience: there is a hard core which his rational mind cannot penetrate. Maybe that is why Stone has him referring to himself in the third person throughout the film.

'They' were always out to get Nixon, without it ever being made clear just exactly who 'they' might be. The imperative for this deeply paranoid man was always to be braced, ready for the coming tackle, or to organise pre-emptive strikes against 'them'. Obstructing justice and tampering with evidence were, to Nixon, self-defensive steps that did not need to be justified. It was obvious that such things had to be done. The mystery at the heart of Watergate - why a president so steeped in criminal conspiracy should tape-record his own intimate conversations - makes sense when viewed from Nixon's end of the telescope. He had to have the goods on his own men, ready for the day when they turned on him. It goes even further. This emotional cripple could not bare his bleeding soul to anyone, so his tapes became his confessional and his confidante. Stone's film repeatedly shows Nixon in his awkward arms-extended, double V-sign pose. It is not by chance that it looks like a crucifixion.

I can't express my opinion of this film any better than a reviewer already did below (which I quote at the end of this review). The acting was brilliant, the portrayal of Nixon intense and interesting, but the structure and presentation of the film left everyone in the room watching with me baffled as to what was going on. In trying to be artistic and clever, Stone totally lost us. I can't tell you how many times we paused the movie to discuss exactly what was going on.

I truly don't know who Stone was targeting audience wise, because I simply wanted to understand Nixon and his place in history and what happened with Watergate, but to understand this film, I would have had to have a complete history and understanding of Nixon himself and the history behind him, which was what I was watching the film for.

As another reviewer said:

"The film hints at so many things, instead of making what happens clear, and presumes you know everything behind every situation, instead of providing any back-story. We get scene after scene, one situation after another with people we're supposed to know beforehand, situations we're expected to know of and understand and if you don't know of these, and you have no way of knowing them, you certainly won't know after watching the film."

Also the way Stone fades the audio in and out for artistic effect is very frustrating as I actually couldn't hear and strained to hear things, which totally threw me off.

After sitting through this painfully long and very drawn-out film, I can't help but feel that it is just slightly... redundant. I watched this with my father, who actually followed Nixon's career to some extent, and I can't deny that without his giving me cliff notes to explain actions and motivation of the characters every so often during the film, I wouldn't understand any of what happened. And that's the sad truth... if you don't know almost everything about Nixon, his time, the political situation, what happened during that period of time, etc. you won't understand it. The film hints at so many things, instead of making what happens clear, and presumes you know everything behind every situation, instead of providing any back-story. We get scene after scene, one situation after another with people we're supposed to know beforehand, situations we're expected to know of and understand and if you don't know of these, and you have no way of knowing them, you certainly won't know after watching the film. The film really isn't the story of Richard M. Nixon as much as it's Oliver Stone's objective presentation of him. How are we supposed to judge this man, his staff, or any of their actions when we don't know the situation or the background of it? Then there are of course those who do know these things... but why would they watch it? They already know the things presented in the movie, and probably from a far more reliable source. So, I guess what it comes down to is: who is this film actually aimed at? Who can watch this and really enjoy it? My father suggested that Stone's intention with this film was to tell the story to young Americans, teenagers who weren't even alive when what the film is about happened. A good cause, but again, it requires them to already know of Nixon. And that is ultimately this movies downfall. The plot is very good, and from what I understand, quite accurate. The pacing is... off, I think is the right word. It switches between going insanely fast and painfully slow, making the film a sure-fire head-ache machine. The acting is perfectly flawless, and most, if not all of the characters based on real people are historically accurate in personality and appearance. The time-line is somewhat messed up, but the basic idea is that Nixon is actually sitting and thinking back on all this stuff, so it makes perfect sense and is used nicely(as opposed to as a cheap gimmick). The film is good, definitely, it's just so limited in who it will appeal to, and the pacing is a real killer(and I don't mean that in the good way). I recommend this to anyone who is interested in Nixon and big fans of Oliver Stone. I suppose very big fans of members of the cast might want to give it a chance as well. 7/10

I love the film Nixon. It is my second favorite Oliver Stone film after Platoon. A lot of people criticize this film as not being 100% historically accurate. This is true. If you really want to learn about President Nixon, it is best to start off with one of the many well respected biographies that have been written. Nixon is an historical drama. Were all of Shakespeare's historical plays 100% accurate? Doubtful. It is not my intention to compare Shakespeare with Oliver Stone, however if you reflect on the life and career or Richard Nixon, it very much mirrors that of a Shakespearean tragedy. Nixon is by no means a hatchet job on the former president. It is at various turns sympathetic and critical. Those not interested in modern American history might be bored by the film (Nixon is over 3 hours!). If this does not include you, see Nixon.

I'm not normally a fan of Oliver Stone (in fact, I've NEVER liked an Oliver Stone picture before)but this one just blew me away. The reason I usually don't like him is that, though he is a great technical director and visual stylist, his scripts are heavy-handed and one-sided to the point of absurdity. But not here. In fact, the script is perhaps the most impressive element in this whole movie, not only for how ambiguous and even-handed it is in dealing with Nixon as a character, but also for the brilliant way it moves around in time. It starts with Nixon, feeling embattled in the White House in 1973 as the Watergate hearings are upon him, and uses the device of him listening to his secret tapes to jump back and forth to previous eras, flawlessly moving between past and present to give an impressionistic, kaleidoscopic overview of the man's life, instead of following the staid and ho-hum linear approach most movie biographies take (most recent example: "Man on the Moon", the bio on Andy Kaufman which was a snoozer in spite of a great performance by Jim Carrey mainly because of the dry boring, "This happened. . .And then this happened" approach).

Another reason to see this film is the brilliant, absolutely overwhelming lead performance by Anthony Hopkins; his Nixon may not look or sound exactly like the 37th president (but come on, except maybe for Ed Sullivan, who does?) but he embodies his qualities - strengths as well as weaknesses - to such an enormous degree that he simply BECOMES Nixon, at least for the three hours the movie is on screen.

I have to say, though, I was not nearly as impressed as every one else (critics and general audiences alike) seems to be about Joan Allen as Pat Nixon. It's nothing against her performance, she did fine, it's just that as written, the part is rather weak. In fact, I was much more bothered about the liberties the filmmakers took in fleshing out her character than in all the political events; it's like, whenever they wanted to have someone blast Nixon or act as his conscience, they'd trot out Ol' Pat, giving her some of the most embarrasingly "speechified" moments in all of the movies - almost none of their scenes together ringed true as husband as wife; it was more like Nixon sitting across from the Filmmakers' Conscience. In fact, she's angry at him so often in the film you have to wonder, what exactly does she love about the man? The film never answers (or attempts to answer) this question.

But this one minor quibble is not enough to make me downgrade this film. It is an absolutely stunning achievement by any stretch of the imagination, and it contains some interesting thematic and technical echoes of both Citizen Kane (cavernous high ceiling scenes, a "March of Time"-type newsreel on Nixon, a dinner scene between Dick and Pat at a long, impersonal table) as well as The Godfather (the burnished, half-dark half-light cinematography, several "chamber of power" scenes in tight, dark and claustrophobic rooms)that I found, in context, to be totally appropriate. It paints both Nixon and the times he (and the country) lived through on a grand and mythic scale that was truly awesome and, once again, entirely appropriate. Yes, it's a film that is at times big, loud and bombastic (because so, after all, was Nixon himself) but, just as often quiet, contemplative and told at an achingly *human* level. The contrast between these two states is what gives the film a good deal of its overall power and, as I've said, I never would have believed that Stone would have been capable of doing the smaller, quieter scenes so well.

This is a good film to have on tape or DVD, for two reasons. It's so long, and so dense with facts, characters and events, that you're not likely to want to watch it all the way straight through (the first time I saw it was in the theater and though I was held spellbound, I began wishing for an intermission at about the two-hour mark, not so much to stretch my legs but to give my brain a chance to process all I'd seen and heard so far). Also, and more importantly, the videotape includes after the credits two scenes cut out of the final film for time purposes. In both cases, I believe, a severe mistake was made - these are both, I believe, ESSENTIAL sequences; not just nice to have as an additional bargain, but scenes which Stone should have fought tooth and nail to keep in (even cutting out some others if he had to - my vote would have been to excise a few of those Pat Nixon scenes instead). Once scene involves Nixon's visit to the CIA and another a discussion between Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover in the Oval Office. The first scene is a masterpiece of writing and acting (with Sam Waterston as CIA Director Richard Helms, otherwise in no other scene of the movie) and the other is, I think, key in understanding Nixon's motivation to begin taping his White House conversations in the first place (also - an issue which is touched on no other place in the movie). I feel that these two scenes should be edited back into their appropriate places in the movie; seeing them separated from the rest of the film is better than not seeing them at all, but they really belong as part of the entire story.

is always good. Specially when you live in Sweden and aren't that familiar with american presidents. I feel a bit wiser but I wasn't moved by the great story. At least I know a lot about Watergate and Nixon and I don't feel as stupid as before when it comes to this matter. And Oliver Stone did a good film, not great but good. Of course, the material wasn't that great so I didn't expect more from the film. I wonder how much weight Anthony Hopkins ganed before making this film. I would love to be an actor and HAVE to eat in order to make a good caracter, but I guess it usually is the opposite way. Well, see the film but don't expect a miracle experience.

I will start by saying I am an Oliver Stone fan. For some particular reason though I did not expect to like this movie but obviously I did. He actually unexpectedly gave a very fair depiction of Nixon. Nixon really transformed before my eyes in here. That was really something special to see.

The acting was quite good. Anthony Hopkins though totally uplifted this movie. I could imagine many people saying his performance was over-the-top or a bit too surreal at times. Yet that is what really made his performance so amazing. The way he was able to transform the many crazy and totally off the wall aspects of Nixon and make them into a reality. To me as the movie went on I felt I was in some way able to see his paranoia, anxiety, thirst for power and just the simple fact of wanting to be liked. I could see he was more of a troubled and vulnerable man than a monster. He never quite connected with anybody which made him bitter and fueled his paranoia and greed even more. To me Hopkins portrayed this all perfectly, all the complexities and inner feelings of Nixon. Hopkins slipped into this role in way that you rarely see. He became Nixon, and at times I was speechless or should I say thoughtless watching him portray such an important figure in such a way. More and more I felt sorry for Nixon, as he looked more and more like a schizophrenic. To me this role was more psychologically bone-chilling than his role as Hannibal Lechter in Silence of the Lambs and I have no problem debating that.

The rest of the cast was quite good as well. Joan Allen was very good in showing the complex relationship/marriage she had with Richard Nixon. James Woods freaked me out at times displaying that pure evil and hatred at times that Hopkins showed as Nixon. Paul Sorvino was very good as Henry Kissinger. Mary Steenburgen was interesting to watch in the very limited time she played in here. The two actors though other than Hopkins though that really stood out to me were Bob Hoskins and Sam Waterston. Despite Hoskins not giving an amazing performance and having very limited time he gave me chills just seeing J. Edgar Hoover being portrayed in some sort of way. Sam Waterston despite being limited to really just one scene was even more chilling than the rest of the cast(excluding Hopkins) combined in that one moment. That moment was one of the most intense face to face scenes that I have ever seen. It was so memorable.

The directing was very good. It was not the best I have seen from Oliver Stone but it was up there. For the first 45 minutes or so I was a bit confused about what was happening and the flow of the movie but I got used to it. The first portion of the movie did feel unbalanced at times but the feel of the movie got better as it wore on. Going back to that one scene between Sam Waterston and Anthony Hopkins, I felt this scene was one of the best directed and written scenes I have seen from Oliver Stone or anyone ever. That scene was a microcosm of the movie. The motion-sickness, mind scrambling, paranoid feeling of that scene captured the entire movie. The feeling of even seeing the president himself being treated like a puppet, despite not that shocking, was mind numbing to watch. That scene was true testament to the writing and directing abilities of Oliver Stone.

The writing was also very good throughout. It seemed as if everything Stone wanted to get across got across. The writing was not amazing but it certainly served it duty. The cinematography was great though. Stone always knows how to get his point across in the way he photographs a movie even if all of other aspects of the movie fail. That dark Oliver Stonish feeling kept on creeping in on every scene, but also that dark psychological feeling that he had put in Born On the Fourth of July and Platoon also was felt through the cinematography. The music by John Williams, who always knows how to capture a moment musically, was simply perfect in here again.

I can understand this movie being boring to a lot of people or it being considered propaganda. Yet I think this movie is an overlooked masterpiece. Just seeing Anthony Hopkins perform as Nixon is a good enough reason to see this movie. He took control of this movie by force and took it to another level. Despite this being an Oliver Stone movie it is more fair than you would think. Of course this movie may have a few conspiracy theories included in it but Oliver Stone never forces his theories on people. There is a reason why at the beginning at every movie he puts a disclaimer saying that not everything in his movies are facts. Despite it being great I don't know if this is a movie for everyone. This movie seems to be crazy and surreal but isn't that how life seems to be at times as well?

President Richard Nixon (Anthony Hopkins) frets over the tapes as he is harassed by calls of impeachment. We are brought back to when he loses the election to JFK. He is left for politically dead as he blames the media. He has his supporters especially the Cuba contingent. Eventually he gets his opening to fight another day. There are also flashbacks to his childhood as Oliver Stone tries to weave a portrait of the man.

This is a political epic about one man. It definitely has Stone's cinematic skills but it is also filled with his personal point of view. It is noticeable which puts some of the movie's validity to question. However, there is no questioning the compelling performance by Hopkins. He is a flawed man always fighting enemies. It's a great performance. The movie is a bit long at over three hours. It's trying to span such a vast period of time and the man lived a big life.

Who could have possibly thought that Oliver Stone would surpass the level reached by "JFK", one of the greatest political thrillers ever made? Yet his "Nixon" is not only the harrowing political biography of the most controversial and unpopular President of the United States, but also the gripping psychological study of a tormented man who got too much to prove. It's also a terrific movie served by an impressive casting: Anthony Hopkins, Joan Allen, James Woods, Bob Hoskins, Ed Harris, E.G. Marshall, Madeline Kahn and an unrecognizable Paul Sorvino as Henry Kissinger. And it's definitely one of the best movies of 1995, which is saying a lot.

"Nixon" borrows a lot of elements from "JFK" on the editing department, swinging back and forth from childhood memories to the present, from the Watergate scandal to its dark premises. The film is complex, almost confusing but never gratuitously because Nixon himself happens to be an enigmatic and larger-than-life character. Roger Ebert even compared the film to "Citizen Kane", establishing an interesting parallel between Richard Nixon and Charles Foster Kane. Nixon does remind of Kane in his excesses, his capability to be disdained by the establishment yet respected within his inner circle, and his heart consumed by an unconscious desire to be loved while trying to hide a torment deeply rooted in his childhood.

The comparison is even truer because like Kane, Nixon hides a terrible secret, although the missing eighteen minutes from the White House recordings would unveil something more unpleasant than the mysterious 'Rosebud'. Behind every great man, there's a secret, but in Nixon's case, there's also a woman. And as Pat Nixon, Joan Allen delivers a subtle but pivotal performance as the woman who evolves in her husband's shadow but in her own supportive way, acts as the only guardian angel of a man who sold his soul to a certain Machiavellian view of power. She believes in his talent to win the election, but not the hearts, people would never love him because she knows how uneasy it was for her to love him.

The chronicles of a man who could never be loved, that could be indeed the subtitle of Nixon's journey in the White House, in his whole political career actually. Indeed, Nixon won two elections, opened China, signed a nuclear treaty with Russia, ended the longest war America ever knew, but as great achievements as they were, Nixon's dark side eclipsed them: Vietnam, Cambodia, Allende, the Watergate. In his most lucid moments, Nixon even recognizes that his road to success was paved by dead bodies, he could go to college because his older brother died of tuberculosis, Jack Kennedy was assassinated, then Bobby, his luck carried the seeds of his doom. This is when the comparison with "JFK" stops, it's not an investigation but a character study.

And as Dick Nixon, Anthony Hopkins never tries to make an impersonation but rather creates his own personification of an eternal outcast, haunted by the ghosts from the past, a man who always had to forge his carapace, by building his own legend through his modest Quaker background "in the poorest farm of California", always using it as an alibi to justify that he's one of the 'little people'. And when an outcast experiments the power, and tastes its irreplaceable savor after the post-War republican wave, he can't renounce it. Nixon knew he was born to rule the most powerful country of the world, like a personal revenge: "Only if you have been in the deepest valley, can you ever know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain." This taste for revenge is his inner demon.

I'm not comparing two characters, but "Nixon" kind of reminded me of "Downfall" in the way the White House is showed, as a sort of bunker where the state's ugliest secrets are covered, a shadowy and gloomy place waiting for the enemy (here the media) to come to the leader. And one by one, like a sinking ship, every faithful soldier is drown in the scandal, and Nixon, as the Captain, is the last to leave. Ebert wrote about Bruno Ganz' performance as Hitler: "Admiration I did not feel. Sympathy I felt in the sense that I would feel it for a rabid dog, while accepting that it must be destroyed." In a lesser measure of course, I think this could work as the right answer to those who believed that Stone, a notorious left wing, created empathy toward Nixon.

Stone never used his patriotism at the expenses of intelligence. Nixon is responsible of his downfall but a whole system is to blame, Nixon was flawed but his enemies weren't nobler. And that's what Stone brilliantly denounces. In many scenes, Nixon reminds the Press of its lack of objectivity, its obsession and outspoken hatred. These words are still relevant today; Nixon is the quintessential incarnation of the 'person we love to hate'. Indeed, with his victory sign trademark, his sweating and angry look contrasting with Kennedy's shining smile, from his "I'm not a crook" to his dog Checkers, from his resignation to "The Simpsons" (he even inspired through his middle-name the name of Milhouse) to hold-up masks, he's in his way, an icon of popular culture, or unpopular if you prefer.

Nixon appears as an individual whose republican obedience veiled his true idealism, his fascination for Lincoln, the President who ended the Civil War, or Kennedy as a beloved figure. People look at Kennedy and want to be him, but when they look at them, they find Nixon, less than a low self-esteem; it's a sentiment of total waste that invades his heart when he look at Kennedy's picture during his last night in the White House. Nixon's tragedy is America's, and maybe that's why he was loathed, because people don't want to look at themselves.

Thanks to the Watergate scandal Nixon is probably one of the best known political figures of the second half of the 20th century. Of course a movie had to be made about him. Oliver Stone did a good job if you ask me. I don't know the full story about Nixon because I wasn't even born then, but it sure gave me a better insight on who the man was and what drove him. I'm sure there are some inaccuracies in the movie, but this is still a movie, not a documentary.

What I liked about this movie was the fact that, even though it must have been very tempting to do the opposite, it did not only show Richard Nixon as the politician that you love to hate, but also as a human being with his good and bad moments in life. I don't know how much of what we saw is true, but I sure can imagine that the man's relationship with his parents and the death of his brothers must have influenced him in his later life.

All in all this is an enjoyable movie, the actors did a good job and it showed what kind of game politics can be. The only negative thing that I can come up with is the length of the movie. If it had been one hour less I would have appreciated it more. Now I give it a 7.5/10, it might have been an 8.5/10.

Hopkins is remarkable as Nixon. Wisely not even trying for an exact likeness, his interpretation of that so-familiar physicality is uncannily evocative. From the very start, the characterisation is spot-on - the jut of the lower jaw, the growly voice, the rounded shoulders. Once the viewer has adjusted to the initial shock, Hopkins IS Nixon. It ceases to be an issue.

Theodore Roosevelt, Washington, Kennedy and (most of all) Lincoln look down from the White House walls at Nixon, their solemn portraits hovering like admonishing ghosts over the Watergate squalor. In life, Roosevelt was bold and self-assured, whereas Nixon dithers: Washington's self-effacing propriety confronts a Nixon who is suggesting that the Nazis were right. Kennedy is everything that Nixon could never be - above all else, at ease with himself. Lincoln looks down, from the office wall and from his marble seat in the Memorial, in silent rebuke as his successor debases the presidency.

Some of the camera tricks don't work. We see Nixon rooted to the spot at Love Field as the camera soars up and away from him. Why? Obtrusive camera movement is justified only if it adds to our understanding of character or plot. This shot seems to have been included merely for its cleverness. The same is true of the little flashes of black-and-white which keep interrupting the action. At one point, in a dialogue between Nixon and Haldeman, the focus is un-subtly and repeatedly thrown from one man to the other. What does this achieve? Is some artistic goal being pursued, or are the effects included for their own sake? What is the symbolic importance (if any) of the vanishing racehorses?

Much of the attention to detail is of a very high order. Stone's writing team has done its homework, and we get authentic touches such as Nixon's love of log fires, which meant having to run the White House air conditioning system at full blast during summer. The reconstructions of the White House interiors are superb. We see Nixon and Pat engaging in a domestic scrap beneath murals of more edifying battles like Yorktown and Saratoga. Historical events, recorded on news film at the time, are brilliantly reconstituted, replacing the real Nixon with the Hopkins version. Thus we get convincing reconstructions of the Kennedy TV debate and the 1962 'retirement' speech. Young Nixon's courtship of Pat is narrated without dialogue as a grainy, jumpy home movie - and is beautifully done. I did not feel quite so positive about the Alger Hiss segment. Welles did this 'newsreel flashback' idea in "Citizen Kane" more than half a century earlier, and did it with such flair that anything which follows is sure to look jaded. It also seemed to me that this passage is badly-placed, coming immediately after the 1962 California defeat.

James Wood plays Bob Haldeman, and does his usual admirable, photogenic best. My quibble with the characterisation is, this isn't THE Haldeman. The historical personage was grimmer, more stately, more formidable (Fred Emery's "Watergate" bears this out). Wood is restricted here to the role of an aide, rather than the Chief of the White House Staff, an emperor within his own (not inconsiderable) domain.

Pat Nixon does not ring true either, but for different reasons. Joan Allen is more than competent as the steely, astute power behind the Nixon throne. The fault is in the characterisation rather than the actor. The real Pat was (so far as one can judge) an altogether less articulate, less philosophical, less knowing individual. Watch her in the REAL "Checkers" broadcast - she is a stiff, repressed, passive woman, a true 1950's Republican wife, not the power broker that this film would have us believe. It is hard to accept, for example, that Nixon's decision to retire in 1962 was his wife's diktat.

There are elements of this otherwise excellent film which simply don't work. Would the President of the United States REALLY be pulled out of a face-to-face meeting with Brezhnev to deal with some Watergate minutiae? The real-life Mitchell said that he tolerated Martha's indiscretions "because I love her". This touching declaration is cheapened in the film, for no good reason. Similarly, Tricia Nixon's exchange with her father was, in real life, an assertion of unconditional loyalty which was both moving and very much to Nixon's credit. The film version has her asking sceptically, "Did you cover up?" This is quite wrong. The Nixon women would have considered it treachery even to frame such a question.

John Williams' epic score is in keeping with the classical tragedy acted out before us. Nixon's tearful prayer with Kissinger and the farewell speech to the White House staff are scenes of extraordinary power.

Paul Sorvino gives us a marvellous Kissinger, though in my humble opinion Stone goes too far when he makes Kissinger the White House 'leaker' and accuses the Secretary of State of complicity in the Watergate break-ins.

One scene which works splendidly is the (true) incident at the Lincoln Memorial. Nixon tries to glad-hand the indignant youngsters, using the hearty, patronising approach of a bygone generation. The sad revulsion of the protesters shows the gulf between Nixon's consciousness and the spirit of the age.

"I hope I haven't let you down" is uttered one single time by Nixon, towards the end of the film. The truth is, he hit on this formula of words and used it again and again during the final days of his presidency. It was a last desperate attempt to tweak our sympathy-nodes. As such, it was utterly gauche, utterly craven, utterly guileful, yet utterly unrealistic. In fact, utterly Nixon.

America's 37th president was most famous for Watergate, but there were other aspects of his life. Oliver Stone's "Nixon" goes into some of these. It shows not only Tricky Dick's presidency (in particular, his escalation of the Vietnam War), but also his early years in Orange County.

However, it seems like they could have shown more. The movie focused heavily on Nixon's alcoholism. True, President Pinocchio (as I like to call him) was often drunk, but I don't know whether or not he was to the extent that they portray in the movie. Moreover, while Stone did a good job looking at Watergate, he probably could have focused more on Nixon's "dirty tricks" campaign to spy on protesters, or his assassinations of Black Panthers and American Indian Movement activists, or his overthrow of Chile's government.

Overall, the movie is worth seeing. Naturally, Nixon's family denounced the movie when it came out, but we know the truth about Tricky Dick: he was a crook, and the movie shows it.

Oliver Stone has turned out some pretty bad stuff, but that aside he is a great director. Unfortunately, "Nixon" is among the former, a movie that drags along and wastes a wonderful cast. It is almost impossible to ever say Anthony Hopkins has been miscast in anything, but here is one case. Hopkins has the potential to give a strong performance, and does, but the performance he gives just is not Nixon! An actor like Gene Hackman or Dustin Hoffman could probably have saved this aspect of the film, but there are so many others. On the plus side, Bob Hoskins' cameo, for one, gives a strong portrayal of J. Edgar Hoover, and there is little to say bad about most of the rest of the cast, but the movie drags on unnecessarily to make what would have been a great movie to catch on HBO. The flashbacks of Nixon's quaker home particularly become tedious. His obsession with JFK may have been true, but Stone may have inserted some of his own fascination with Kennedy and falsified parts of the story. What results is a fil too long to be enjoyed. A movie that already requires prior knowledge of the politics of the time to make it comprehensible.

This one has always been one of my all-time favorites. As a political science major, I was fascinated the first time I saw it, and have seen it several times since. You almost have to to assimilate everything. But as a political science junkie and a history nerd, I always found this film to be very entertaining and fun to watch, especially if you're a historian who's also read other books on the Nixon administration, All the President's Men, etc.

This film gives a very raw look into the world of the Presidency and politics. I think Hopkins did a wonderful job as Nixon, as well as the rest of the cast (namely Bob Hoskins as J. Edgar Hoover and Ed Harris as E. Howard Hunt). From a historian's perspective, I think it did a fair job of looking at what Nixon's career was like, the disappointments he experienced, the struggles he made, the mistakes he committed, and the situation he found himself in once he finally became President. The film's a bit long (especially the redone version = 3.5 hours), but I think it's worth it.

And I'm fully aware of Oliver Stone's background. I've always had a mixed reaction with Mr. Stone. Two of my favorite films ever are Nixon and Alexander (and I'm even a Greek Republican), yet the only film I've ever walked out on was JFK. JFK was just too much; the only assassination theory Stone didn't throw in it was the UFO theory. But as far as Nixon goes, I commend Stone for giving a fair portrayal of him, knowing what a notorious liberal he is. And once again, this is coming from a moderate Republican.

Extremists will hate this film. Ultra-conservatives will look as this film with skepticism and claim it's BS while radical liberals will claim it's "too sympathetic" toward Nixon. But for anyone with open eyes who isn't narrow-minded one way or the other, or for anyone interested in what the world of politics is like, I highly recommend this film. Like I said, it's always been one of my all-time favorites.

I have heard of WATER GATE, but I did not know much about it. This film is good chance for me to know it and R.NIXON. I saw J.F.K yesterday. Enumeration of names and ages made me sick in history class. I wish my teacher could see me this kind of films when I was a student.

Without doubt Anthony Hopkins performance as Richard Nixon cements his position as one of the finest and most powerful actors of the last 20 years. Without bearing any great resemblance, he gets closer to inhabiting the almost impenetrable enigma that was Nixon than any other actor could do. Looking beyond his towering portrayal, the performances of the supporting cast are mostly exemplary. You just know that James Woods and JT Walsh were born to play Haldeman and Ehrlichman. Ed Harris is a chilling Howard Hunt, Mary Steenburgen a dedicated but controlled and ultimately unaffectionate mother, Powers Boothe a loyal but pragmatic Al Haig, Bob Hoskins a thoroughly devious J Edgar Hoover and Madeleine Kahn a delightfully outspoken Martha Mitchell. If I had to quibble I would say that Joan Allen makes Pat Nixon a far steelier character than she probably was and EG Marshall is too old to play John Mitchell. Oliver Stone does not play too fast and loose with the real story and endeavours to explore Nixon's childhood and other events in his life to try to explain what what made him what he became. Occasionally he is more sympathetic than one might have expected. The use of black and white is overdone, although real footage is skilfully interlaced with the acting. But the ultimate triumph is Hopkins' performance.

I loved this movie when I saw it in theaters in 1995, and I was thrilled to order the Blu-Ray "Election Year" version (with tons of commentaries and documentaries) for just ten dollars from Amazon.

Having re-watched the three hour director's cut over three nights, I was more impressed than ever. Yes, NIXON takes the man many hated as a one dimensional villain and turns him into a poignant, tragic hero. But the greatness of the film goes beyond Anthony Hopkins' performance.

What I loved best about NIXON was the supporting cast, many of whom seemed much more comfortable in their historical roles than Welsh Hopkins as the All-American Nixon. I loved Joan Allen's fragile sexuality, her poignant loneliness, the subtle class and sophistication she brought to First Lady Pat Nixon. James Woods was born to play H.R. Haldeman. A superb character actor, Woods exudes not only sleazy corruption but brutal menace and a genuinely shrewd understanding of politics as jungle combat. Ed Harris as E. Howard Hunt portrays a very different sort of lowlife -- a Joseph Conrad style mercenary and man of action who has broken the rules for Nixon time and again and feels a genuine rage at being betrayed by his boss. Even Paul Sorvino, best known for playing Italian mob types in Mafia classics like GOODFELLAS, is surprisingly effective as the cultured, genial, yet unmistakably brutal and unscrupulous Henry Kissinger.

The thing that makes this movie such a fascinating failure is the immense scope of what Oliver Stone wants to accomplish. It's not just a story of the Watergate break-in and the infamous cover-up. It's not just a study of American power during the Cold War. And it's not just a character study about a ruthless, powerful, but deeply insecure man who rose to power and was destroyed by his own character flaws. NIXON tries to be all those stories, all at the same time. Some elements work better than others. Brutally effective political drama, and spine-tingling suspense and intrigue, are frequently interrupted by unintentionally funny "character" moments.

Oliver Stone never did have much of a sense of humor, and while that doesn't hurt the political scenes it's deadly in the personal moments. The horrible dying brother scenes go on too long, (the boy Nixon watches his big brother spit up blood with a Darth Vader like lack of compassion) and college boy Nixon remembers being knocked on his ass on the football field a few times too many. There are also some disastrous casting choices, i.e. sweet Mary Steenburgen as Nixon's ice-cold witch of a mother, Hannah Nixon. The movie never seems to decide whether Nixon's mother was every bit the saint he pretends, or whether she was just one more person who let him down. Oliver Stone seems to think that the mere presence of the mother is some sort of startling insight. Like watching the young Nixon getting knocked down on the football field. The flashback scenes are by far the weakest thing about Nixon.

NIXON is not a perfect masterpiece like THE MALTESE FALCON or even JFK. Whole scenes are disastrous, and whole performances fall flat. You never will figure out just what happened during the Bay of Pigs, what Nixon really knew about that day in Dallas, or even what was on those tapes! But if you have the patience to sit through it you will be richly rewarded by an amazing panorama of talent.

This film had so much potential but when you have someone like Oliver Stone making the film, you can't expect much more than hatred, lies, and nonsense. Stone is infamous for making films that bear little semblance to reality. He twists and distorts every single factual story and warps it into the way he wants reality to appear. "Nixon" is shot in a non-linear fashion and is utterly boring. There's nothing interesting nor is there anything that rivets you to your chair. Oliver Stone has done the same thing with his other films and what could you expect with a film about Nixon, the man he blames for Vietnam, even though Nixon had nothing to do with starting the war and in fact worked round the clock to bring an end to the war. Stone never sees the real picture. Don't waste your time.