Affliction is a 1997 American neo-noir crime drama directed and written by Paul Schrader. Based on the 1989 novel by Russell Banks, the film stars Nick Nolte, Sissy Spacek, James Coburn, and Willem Dafoe.
Affliction had its world premiere at the 54th Venice International Film Festival on August 28, 1997, and was released in the United States on December 30, 1998, by Lions Gate Films. The film received positive reviews from critics, who mostly lauded the performances of Nolte and Coburn. At the 71st Academy Awards, Nolte was nominated for Best Actor and Coburn won for Best Supporting Actor. It earned six nominations at the 14th Independent Spirit Awards, including Best Feature.
Plot
Rolfe Whitehouse begins the film, announcing the story of his brother Wade's "strange criminal behavior" and subsequent disappearance.
Wade Whitehouse is a small-town policeman in New Hampshire. On Halloween night, Wade meets his daughter Jill, but he is late and the evening is overshadowed by disharmony. Jill eventually calls her mother, Wade's ex-wife, to come and pick her up. When his ex-wife finally arrives, Wade shoves her husband against their car and watches them drive away with Jill. Wade vows to get a lawyer to help gain custody of his daughter.
The next day, Wade rushes to the scene of a crime. Jack Hewitt, a local hunting guide, claims that Evan Twombley, with whom he was hunting, accidentally shot and killed himself. The police believe Jack, but Wade grows suspicious, believing that Twombley was killed by Jack. When he is informed that the victim was scheduled to testify in a lawsuit, his suspicion slowly turns into conviction.
A while later, Wade and his girlfriend Margie Fogg arrive at the house of Wade's alcoholic father, Glen Whitehouse, whose abusive treatment of Wade and Rolfe as children is seen in flashbacks throughout the film. Wade finds his mother lying dead in her bed from hypothermia. Glen reacts to her death with little surprise, and later gets drunk at her wake and gets into a fight with Wade.
Rolfe, who has come home for the funeral, suggests at first that Wade's murder theory could be correct, but later renounces himself of this presumption. Nonetheless, Wade becomes obsessed with his conviction. When Wade learns that town Selectman Gordon Lariviere is buying up property all over town with the help from a wealthy land developer named Mel Gordon, also Twombley's son-in-law, he makes the solving of these incidents his personal mission. Suffering from a painful toothache and becoming increasingly socially detached, he behaves more and more unpredictably. He follows Jack, convinced that Jack is running away from something and is involved in a conspiracy. After a car chase, a nervous Jack finally pulls over, threatens Wade with a rifle, shoots out his tires, and drives off.
Finally, Wade is fired for harassing Jack and trashing Lariviere's office. He collects Jill from her mother's house, where his ex-wife furiously castigates him over his plans to sue for full custody. At a local restaurant, after being verbally abused, he attacks the bartender in front of his daughter. Then Wade takes Jill home to find Margie leaving him. Wade grabs Margie and begs her to stay, but Jill rushes up and tries to stop the fight. In response, Wade angrily pushes Jill, giving her a bloody nose, forcing both her and Margie to drive off.
Wade is then approached by Glen, who congratulates him for finally acting as a "real man". The latent aggression between the men culminates in another fight in which Wade hits his father with the butt of a rifle, accidentally killing him. Wade burns the corpse in the barn, sits down at the kitchen table and starts drinking.
Rolfe's narration reveals that Wade eventually murdered Jack and left town (possibly to Canada, where Jack's truck was found three days later), never to return. Rolfe relates that the town later became part of a huge ski resort partly organized by Gordon Lariviere, but he had nothing to do with either Jack or Twombley. Rolfe concludes that someday a vagrant resembling Wade might be found frozen to death, and that will be the end of the story.
Cast
- Nick Nolte as Wade Whitehouse
- Brawley Nolte as Young Wade Whitehouse
- James Coburn as Glen Whitehouse (Wade's Abusive Father)
- Sissy Spacek as Margie Fogg
- Willem Dafoe as Rolfe Whitehouse
- Michael Caloz as Young Rolfe Whitehouse
- Mary Beth Hurt as Lillian Whitehouse
- Jim True as Jack Hewitt
- Marian Seldes as Alma Pittman
- Holmes Osborne as Gordon LaRiviere
- Brigid Tierney as Jill Whitehouse
- Sean McCann as Evan Twombley
- Wayne Robson as Nick Wickham
- Eugene Lipinski as J. Battle Hand
- Tim Post as Chick Ward
- Christopher Heyerdahl as Frankie Lacoy
- Janine Theriault as Hettie Rogers
- Paul Stewart as Mr. Horner
- Sheena Larkin as Lugene Brooks
- Penny Mancuso as Woman Driver
Production
According to Paul Schrader, he came across a paperback copy of the novel in a bookstore and bought it after he was "grabbed" by its first sentence. After he finished reading the book, Schrader bought the film rights from Russell Banks. The director said in an interview with Filmmaker that he identified with the characters in the story: "I had a very strong father and an older male sibling. My father was not abusive, he was not alcoholic, but there were enough similarities. I came from that part of the country with long cold winters, so I knew these people, and I knew their violence." According to Schrader, he offered Nolte the part five years before filming began, when the actor had become a bankable star following his success with the box office hits The Prince of Tides and Cape Fear, both released in 1991. Although Nolte was interested in playing Wade, Schrader could not afford him at first. It was not until five years later when Nolte agreed to do Affliction for less money. It was Nolte who brought Affliction to the attention of Bart Potter, the head of Largo Entertainment.
Reception
On Rotten Tomatoes, Affliction has an approval rating of 88% based on 50 reviews from critics, with an average rating of 7.60/10. The consensus reads, "Dark and bleak, the 'kick-ass' performances, especially Nolte's 'effective' portrayal of an abused soul, is the reason to see this film."
Critic Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film four stars. Janet Maslin in The New York Times wrote "[Nick Nolte] gives the performance of his career in Paul Schrader's quietly stunning new film [...] Like The Sweet Hereafter, a more meditative and elegant but less immediate, volcanic film, Affliction finds the deeper meaning in an all too believable tragedy."
In a negative review in the Time Out Film Guide, Geoff Andrew called the film a "sensitive but rather dull adaption of Russell Banks' novel [...] the narrative's too unfocused and low-key really to engage the heart or mind."
Awards and nominations
{| class="wikitable plainrowheaders sortable"
|-
! Award
! Category
! Recipient(s)
! Result
|-
| rowspan="2"| Academy Awards
| Best Actor
| Nick Nolte
|
|-
| Best Supporting Actor
| James Coburn
|
|-
| Chlotrudis Awards
| Best Actor
| rowspan="2"| Nick Nolte
|
|-
| Golden Globe Awards
| Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama
|
|-
| rowspan="6"| Independent Spirit Awards
| Best Feature
| Linda Reisman
|
|-
| Best Director
| Paul Schrader
|
|-
| Best Male Lead
| Nick Nolte
|
|-
| Best Supporting Male
| James Coburn
|
|-
| Best Screenplay
| Paul Schrader
|
|-
| Best Cinematography
| Paul Sarossy
|
|-
| Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards
| Best Actor
| Nick Nolte
|
|-
| rowspan="2"| National Society of Film Critics Awards
| colspan="2"| Best Film
|
|-
| Best Actor
| Nick Nolte
|
|-
| rowspan="3"| New York Film Critics Circle Awards
| colspan="2"| Best Film
|
|-
| Best Director
| Paul Schrader
|
|-
| Best Actor
| rowspan="6"| Nick Nolte
|
|-
| rowspan="2"| Online Film & Television Association Awards
| Best Actor
|
|-
| Best Drama Actor
|
|-
| Sant Jordi Awards
| Best Foreign Actor
|
|-
| Satellite Awards
| Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama
|
|-
| rowspan="2"| Screen Actors Guild Awards
| Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role
|
|-
| Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role
| James Coburn
|
|-
| rowspan="4"| Valladolid International Film Festival
| Golden Spike
| Paul Schrader
|
|-
| Best Actor
| Nick Nolte
|
|-
| Best Director of Photography
| Paul Sarossy
|
|-
| Youth Jury Award (Special Mention)
| Paul Schrader
|
|-
| Young Artist Awards
| Best Performance in a Feature Film: Supporting Young Actress
| Brigid Tierney
|
|}
See also
- List of films set around Halloween