10/21/08: Dick (1999)It’s almost exactly two years
since we mentioned that we’d eventually write about
Dick. We’d have gotten around to it a few months ago, but
Hamlet 2—the heavily hyped comedy from
Dick writer/director Andrew Fleming—died at the box office. We haven’t thought about the film since then. Now we have to admit that the ladies at the Oxygen cable network get the credit for associating this political comedy with the release of Oliver Stone’s
W. At least we’ll be gentlemanly enough to assume they planned things that way while airing
Dick this weekend.
In any case,
Dick succeeds in what Oliver Stone is pretending to do with
W., and failed to do with
Nixon.
Dick puts a human face on a controversial Republican President.
Betsy (Kirsten Dunst) and Arlene (Michelle Williams) are two teenage girls enjoying the early ’70s. Arlene lives at the Watergate, and they inadvertently expose some burglars while sneaking downstairs to send a letter to the Bobby Sherman Fan Club. Then they recognize G. Gordon Liddy (Harry Shearer) from the crime scene while on a class trip to the White House. They also pick up a souvenir that’ll turn out to be an incriminating document on the Committee to Re-Elect the President.
Some merry mishaps lead to the girls meeting a concerned H.R. Haldeman (Dave Foley), and then President Nixon (Dan Hedaya, doing fine work after probably winning the coin toss over Lane Smith). Nixon’s having troubles with Checkers, who just isn’t very affectionate. The dog is very fond of Betsy and Arlene, though, so Nixon makes them the official White House dog walkers.
(We’ve seen several reviews where critics insist this is because Nixon is trying to appease the girls, since the President believes they’ve stumbled on some big secrets. That’s not true. Nixon’s being nice. Still, most rave reviews for
Dick insist that the story’s a triumph of naiveté over calculating bastards. Keep reading, though.)
This first meeting is interrupted by Henry Kissinger (Saul Rubinek), informing the President that they have a meeting with the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Arlene takes this opportunity to make an important statement. “War,” she intones, “is not healthy for children and other living things.” Nixon likes that, but Haldeman gets the last word as he leaves the room: “If you have a problem with Vietnam, talk to Johnson!”
Betsy and Arlene go back to the White House to begin their new jobs, but can’t get past the guards. Fortunately, one of their attempts gets them close enough for Kissinger to take notice. He assures the guards that the girls are welcome. “We’ve had discussions about foreign policy,” he explains.
From there,
Dick is the tale of two girls who keep randomly affecting history. This includes the sad story of how Arlene—who eventually develops quite a crush on the President—ends up feeling betrayed once she discovers that Nixon isn’t as sweet to grown men as he is to a young girl. She discovers this while leaving an 18-and-a-half-minute message of love to Nixon on a tape recorder in Rose Mary Woods’ desk.
The important thing here is that Rose Mary Woods is portrayed as a very nice woman. As noted, Kissinger’s a pretty good guy, and the same goes for the beleaguered Haldeman. You know who’s kind of prissy? John Dean (as played by Jim Breur). He’s exactly the kind of guy who’d have a major crisis of conscience over the outrage of two teenagers.
The biggest clowns in the movie are Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein (Will Ferrell and Bruce McCulloch, respectively). They’re bumbling and vain, and only stumble on their big scoops thanks to their general idiocy. This is the point where some film critics (meaning the ones who couldn’t make up their own story) decided there was something just not right about
Dick. To be fair, the film was already set to bomb with a big set piece built around the peace talks with Leonid Brezhnev. We watched
Dick while asking the same question that many asked about
W.: Who is this film being made for?
Well,
Dick isn’t a bad film for conservatives. There’s no whitewashing of our 37th President, but Nixon still gets a uniquely sympathetic treatment. He’s nice enough to end the war in Vietnam after Betsy’s brother gets drafted. She’s more concerned with how she’s going to redecorate his bedroom once he’s overseas. To be fair, Nixon’s certainly trying to appease the girls when he appoints them as “secret youth advisors.” That still pays off once they teach him how to raise two fingers to make a peace sign.
And this sweet comedy—which, for those who might be offended, occasionally becomes a drug comedy—is still serious about respecting Betsy and Arlene as young Americans. They even remain likable while helping to bring down an administration. The girls aren’t petulant just because their newfound idol is a fraud. Unlike their Leftist contemporaries, Betsy and Arlene really care about the good of their country. You don’t get the impression that either will end up as a first-time voter for Jimmy Carter.
Make it your own: As noted,
Dick died at the box office. The film still got a pretty decent
DVD release for a 1999 production. It includes a director’s commentary that we’ve never bothered to enjoy. Maybe it’ll contradict everything we said here—but we’ll always have
Bad Dreams.
Now we just realized we could’ve put off writing about this one until
Frost/Nixon comes out in early December. We bet those gals at Oxygen won’t think of that.
