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As Good as It Gets

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As Good as It Gets
Original film poster
Directed byJames L. Brooks
Written byStory:
Mark Andrus
Screenplay:
Mark Andrus
James L. Brooks
Produced byLaura Ziskin
StarringJack Nicholson
Helen Hunt
Greg Kinnear
Cuba Gooding, Jr.
Shirley Knight
Skeet Ulrich
CinematographyJohn Bailey
Edited byRichard Marks
Music byHans Zimmer
Distributed byTriStar Pictures
Release dates
December 25, 1997
Running time
139 min.
LanguageEnglish

As Good as It Gets is a 1997 comedy film directed by James L. Brooks starring Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture and won for Best Actor and Best Actress. It portrays an obsessive-compulsive, misanthropic bigot who becomes involved in the lives of a single mother and gay neighbor and how they grow personally as a result of knowing each other.

Plot

Melvin Udall is a racist, homophobic, and anti-Semitic misanthrope who works from home as a romance novelist in New York. He suffers from obsessive-compulsive disorder which, paired with his misanthropy, puts off the neighbors in his apartment building in Manhattan as well as everyone with whom he comes into contact.

Melvin eats breakfast at the same table in the same restaurant everyday using disposable plastic utensils he brings with him due to his pathological germophobia. He takes an interest in a his waitress, Carol Connelly (Helen Hunt), the only server at the restaurant who can tolerate his demanding behavior.

One day, Melvin's neighbor, a gay artist named Simon Bishop (Greg Kinnear), is assaulted in his own apartment. Melvin is forced to take care of the artist's dog Verdell while he is in the hospital. Although he at first begrudgingly accepts to care for the dog, Melvin becomes emotionally attached to Verdell and at the same time gains more attention from Carol, his waitress at the restaurant. A change occurs in his character and he discreetly arranges for a doctor to visit Carol's home and see her asthmatic son Spencer. Wary of owing Melvin for this goodwill gesture, Carol takes the train to his apartment in the middle of the night to tell him that she will not sleep with him.

After returning from the hospital, Simon needs Melvin's help in driving to Baltimore to ask his estranged parents for money. Melvin invites Carol to accompany them on the trip to lessen the awkwardness between the two men and so he can court Carol romantically. She reluctantly accepts the invitation and relationships between the three develop.

At dinner in Baltimore, Melvin accidentally insults Carol and she refuses to see him again upon returning to New York, though she later feels bad about it. The relationship between Melvin and Carol remains complicated until Simon convinces Melvin to declare his love for her at her apartment in Brooklyn, where the two realize the depth of their personal connection. Melvin admits that he wants to be a better person because of her. The film ends with Melvin and Carol taking a walk at five in the morning together to the corner bakery to buy some fresh bread.

Primary cast

Reception

The film received generally positive reviews from film critics and was nominated for and received many film awards, including an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture and a Golden Globe award for Best Picture-Music or Comedy. Metacritic, a web site that evaluates films by averaging its overall critical response, gave the film a metascore of 67, signifying generally favorable reviews.[1] The film's two lead actors, Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt, both received Academy and Golden Globe awards for their performances. Chicago Reader film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum wrote that what director James Brooks "Manages to do with (the characters) as they struggle mightily to connect with one another is funny, painful, beautiful, and basically truthful--a triumph for everyone involved."[2]

However, praise for the film was not uniform among critics. Roger Ebert gave "As Good As it Gets," three stars (out of four) and called the film a "compromise, a film that forces a smile onto material that doesn't wear one easily," writing that the film drew "back to story formulas," but had good dialog and performances.[3]. Washington Post critic Desson Howe gave a generally negative review of the movie, writing that it "gets bogged down in sentimentality, while its wheels spin futilely in life-solving overdrive." [4]

Awards won

Award nominations

References

  1. ^ [1] Retrieved on January 7 2009
  2. ^ [2]. Retrieved on January 7 2009
  3. ^ [3] Retrieved on January 7 2009
  4. ^ [4]. Retrieved on January 7 2009
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Awards
Preceded by Golden Globe: Best Motion Picture, Musical or Comedy
1997 		Succeeded by
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