THE NICKEL RIDE
US, 1975, 99 minutes, Colour.
Jason Miller, Linda Haynes, Victor French, John Hillerman, Bo Hopkins.
Directed by Robert Mulligan.
This is a little-seen film of master director, Robert Mulligan. Mulligan had directed much television during the 1950s and his debut feature film was Fear Strikes Out with Anthony Perkins. He was to have a very successful career especially during the 1960s along with his producing partner, Alan Pakula. Some of the films include The Great Impostor, a masterpiece, To Kill a Mockingbird, Love with the Proper Stranger, Inside Daisy Clover, Up the Down Staircase, The Stalking Moon and The Summer of ’42. However, he made only a few films during the 1970s (The Other, Bloodbrothers, Same Time Next Year) and only two films during the 1980s.
The film was written by Eric Roth. Roth was thirty at the time that the film was produced and during the 1970s he continued to write quite a number of interesting screenplays including The Drowning Pool, The Onion Field. Very few films during the 1980s, only Suspect and Memories of Me. However, in 1994 he started solid work and won an Oscar with Forrest Gump and was to make a succession of films in the coming years including The Postman, The Horse Whisperer, The Insider, Ali, Munich, The Good Shepherd, Lucky You and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, showing that a career can be very strong for someone in his fifties and sixties.
Jason Miller (The Exorcist) portrays a small-time criminal who wants to buy a block of land in Los Angeles otherwise he loses his career – and, in fact at the end of the film, his life.
1. How interesting and enjoyable a film? It had very little commercial release. Why?
2. The interest in gangster films in the seventies? Police films, the Mafia, corruption? How did this film fit into the atmosphere and styles of these films? Their popularity, their probing of American criminal activity?
3. The style of the films colour, Panavision? The colours of the city, the atmosphere and look of the city? The contrast with the country? Locations, sets, musical score?
4. The director, Robert Mulligan, is noted for his more human treatment of serious themes. Is this true of his treatment of a small-time gangster, his ageing and crisis, his coping with violence? The people associated with bim? The themes of professionalism, success and failure, love, violence? How did this compare with more conventional, action-packed treatment of gangsters?
5. The significance of the title? Its reference to Cooper and his being edged out of his gangster career? How important was it for the audience to see and understand a person like Cooper? Age, appearance, background, way of life, moral attitudes, relationship with the people in his world? ,His skills, hopes? His being small-time and even second-rate? His being edged out of his position? His not realising this at first and working hard? The parallel of any professional man? The breaking down of his way of life, the breaking down of his personality, the inevitability of final violence? A portrait of a small American gangster?
6. Audience response initially to Cooper? His being pictured at the beginning of the day, the wide screen close-ups and then the presentation of his character? The importance of the dock and his getting the warehouses for his bosses? The importance and significance of his keys and his name? His relationship with his henchmen? Seeing him In operation with the various gangsters especially as regards the rigging of the fight, the discussion with his superiors?
7. The film's portrait of Cooper's day? His relationship with Sarah and the bond of love between them? The domestic scenes and his ordinariness? Taking that out into his relationship with people? And yet his sense of failure?
8. The gallery of people that Cooper encountered? The man with the lucky charms, the bar-owner, his henchman at the desk? The skill In portraying these characters quickly - in themselves and in relationship to Cooper? As illustrating his kind of world? The importance of his office, his desk, his dealing with people and his authority?
9. The film interjected many human sequences into the portrait of a gangster especially the birthday party in the bar. The atmosphere and enjoyment of this? The human touch to this world? The visiting gangsters and their impression? People's admiration for Cooper, his own self-esteem? The insertion of the holiday sequence and the lyrical rural sections with Sarah?
10. The portrait of Carl, his henchmen? Carl’s place in the gangster world? Authority, deals, double-crosses? Discussion, discussions in cars, the continued threat of violence? The need for money, the focus on money, borrowings etc.? The importance of money for Cooper and his need to borrow and control?
11. The introduction of the assassin? The modern cowboy in the city, the gunfighter and man of violence? Personality, coming from out of town, enigmatic smile, Ingratiating himself Into Cooper's presence? The pose of learning and helping? His killing and the inevitability of his confrontation with Cooper? The portrait of this kind of contemporary professional killer?
12. Cooper's fears, the importance of his mental breaking down and his imaginings? The dramatic impact of his visualising Sarah's death and the audience accepting this as real and then emotionally responding? The lyrical nature, the flowers, the country etc.? The sudden realisation that Sarah was not dead and that this was happening in Cooper's mind? The dramatic impact and helping audiences to understand?
13. The consequence of Cooper's breakdown, Carl edging him out and his still using suave talk, Sarah and her pleas, the assassin and his continued menacing presence? The inevitability of Cooper's death? The visualising of violence and death in the imagination - especially Cooper and the violent confrontation with the killer? The preparation for the quiet and muted death of Cooper?
14. The film returning at the end to where it began - the street, the warehouse, the bar? The man with the lucky charms and the irony of the bad luck for Cooper? The pathos of the man sitting dead in the street?
15. How valuable an exploration of 20th century American urban crises, values? The background of gangsterism in America - action, drama and melodrama, the insight into the human beings involved in this world?
