Jack Nicholson as Melvin Udall in As Good as It Gets

Best Actor at the 70th Annual Oscars (1997)

Notable Quote:

“People who talk in metaphors oughta shampoo my crotch.”

Synopsis:

If this is as good as it gets, put me out of my misery.

The character:

Melvin Udall (imagine a more hideous name) is a racist, homophobic bigot who throws a dog down a garbage chute (!!!!) within the first two minutes of the movie. Now this would be one thing if he was a villain, but he’s the leading protagonist of this ~quirky~ comedy, and you’re about to spend the next two hours and twenty minutes with him. Congratulations! I mean, the torrent of horrible shit that comes out of his mouth is irredeemable. A Jewish couple sits at his usual table at the diner and he makes fun of their big noses. He says that women have no “reason or accountability”. He uses all manner of egregious homophobic slurs. Stomach-churning stuff.

If it seems like I just breezed by so much prejudice and bigotry … well, that’s because there’s so much problematic shit to get through in this film. For instance, I haven’t yet mentioned the fact that Melvin has obsessive-compulsive disorder! First of all, of course it’s presented as this cute personality trait, like, isn’t OCD funny?! He can’t step on a crack, LOL! Mental illness doesn’t completely derail people’s lives at all! Even worse, the movie seems to see a really clear link between his assholery and his illness. Like, of course he’s an ass, he has OCD – I’m sorry, what?? OCD does not make you a homophobe! And then of course he’s cured once he falls in love with Carol, because that’s how mental health works.

And don’t even get me started on the relationship with Carol. Basically, she waits on his table, and because she’s the bare minimum nice to him, he decides to pay for her kid’s medical bills. Carol makes all these really insightful and accurate points about how she doesn’t wanna accept this man’s money because then she’ll owe him, but her stupid mom is like, no no, take a gift for once. And of course, once she does, she’s absolutely trapped, and he won’t stop pursuing her, despite the fact that she repeatedly turns him down, begs him to stop showing up outside her apartment, etc. Simon put it best when he called Melvin an “absolute horror of a human being”.

The performance:

I’m completely over Jack Nicholson, sorry not sorry. To once again reference iconic Real Housewife Kelly Killoren Bensimon: “I don’t think you’re funny, I don’t think you’re charming.” He yells like a maniac, and makes wild faces, and I just find myself going, yeah yeah, I’ve seen it before, dude. I generally try not to read reviews before writing my thoughts, but I had to know if anyone hated this movie as much as I did (survey says … no, sigh), and there seems to be this idea that this character would be a total nightmare played by anyone else, but because it’s Jack Nicholson, you can’t hate him. What!? Jack Nicholson seems like a huge asshole, seeing a character played by him is only ever going to make me like that character less.

The movie:

Obviously, I’ve talked about what a toxic nightmare it is to present Melvin as some kind of redeemable hero, and I wanna use this space to dig specifically into his bigotry. There’s a tendency for powerful people who haven’t experienced oppression (like say, the folks who make decisions in Hollywood) to think that things like racism and homophobia are garden variety rude traits, rather than toxic cultural attitudes that get people killed. Like, as a gay man, it’s hard to think of Melvin’s slurs as goofy, because I’m feeling scared of whether I’m going to be a victim of a homophobic attack? The fact that he’s the center of the story, rather than the folks he routinely berates and mistreats, says a lot about the film’s point-of-view. You could argue that he redeems himself from his bullshit, but like, does he? He falls in love with Carol, and he’s nice to a gay man now, so even on the most basic level, he’s not any less of a bigot. Please, flush this movie down the toilet.

Was the Oscar deserved?

No, we had already awarded the Jack Nicholson thing (twice!), we didn’t need to do it again.