what makes this movie so great for me is that at first, we think he is fooling the system and he is actually not crazy, just lazy. But then, as the movie goes along, we realize that he is crazy, in the sense that he is just too sensible for this world. He is too human. He doesnt bail on his friends even at the expense of his own freedom, he doesnt betray anybody or lie and he doesnt sit down when he sees injustice. He is too real for this world, and so, he is crazy by its standards. Like the chief says, he is too big, so they work on him.
Juan... That line is great... but the reason he's in there is because he might have gotten a choice in court, prison or a mental home, and he picked the mental home thinking it'd be easier. He didn't know they could keep you indefinitely. I don't see where I ever saw him as lazy.
@@noname-by3qz That could be. I don't think you get to choose where you serve your time. a lot of people think mental institutions are an easier life so they try to pretend they are insane. that's what the warden points out to him. that because he is lazy and doesn't want to do the hard work inmates do, he might pretending to be crazy to be sent to a mental institution, not realizing that he has to serve more time that way. I as audience also thought this at the start of the movie. whether he does it intentionally or not doesn't really matter to me. in the end it is proven that his behavior is actually out of order and insane by this society's standards
Nicholson is such a fortuitous combination of interesting face, nascent acting ability, and desire to plunge himself into roles. I hope that future generations revere his body of work properly.
Hell, just his eyebrows alone are worth millions. I'm not even joking. He got as much out of his V brows as DeNiro has out of his squint faces and lookaways w/ his eyes.
Idk if it’s exactly that, Mc murphy was a criminal who had multi assaults and statutory rape charges. The rest of them are voluntary as we know from this scene. They do have mental health issues and prefer a this place maybe because they fear the outside world or are comfortable in the boundaries there in right now. Mc murphy is prob a bit of a psycho or sociopath but like he said , there not much crazier than alot of people in the outside world. Nurse Ratchet was just a control freak who probably is also he a sociopath herself the way she treats these guys. Or it could be that mc murphy threw a huge wrench in the whole operation on this ward cuz hes particularly sane enough to not be there but causes choas as soon as he arrives.
@@adamrie3484 I think the institutionalized symbolize the people of natural individualistic nature made crazier by society and the "fake help" it can provide sometimes. Like that place run by collective-minded control freaks, more concerned with status than the purpose of their job. The crazies there are not taught to get by or do better but instead are convinced into feeling dependent. But it needs to seem that way so the staff can continue to have a job where they get a kick out of messing with people or having something to point at and compare themselves to. They hated that a criminal with the common sense to see it did a better job at ACTUALLY helping them than they did.
@@asher9349 I definitely agree that he did a better job in helping them and that their mental conditions were probably made more severe in a place like that. But the staff could have grown complacent with the treatment of these guys cause their so used to the fact the patients aren’t improving, and the patients seem to be complacent too. At the time idk if anyone really had a understanding or way of treating them (just like how there’s still alot of mental illness we dont know how to properly treat) thats why they could authorize things like lobotomies and electro shock therapy to try and “help” them. When mcmurphy comes along he opens up doors to both sides. Then we see the staff, as well as the patients change a bit. The patients for the better and the staff gets more concerned and controlling. Mcmurphy destroys the order they set, regardless if its for the good or bad but some of the characters in the story like billy ended up with a bad outcome and it was ultimately from Mcmurphy being sent to the institution. And him being sent there also made Chief achieve freedom and realization that he doesn’t need this place and to go out and live his life in the world. Ive seen it a couple times and always have had a bunch of perspectives on it. Theres so much to it thats why it’s probably my favorite movie.
Watched this with my uncle numerous times when I was younger...he died from pancreatic cancer a year ago... this is one of my favorite movies to remember him by.
I know. Especially in this particular movie he was like the down to earth coolest guy in the asylum and everybody liked him because he was very cool and brought good vibes and nurse Rachet was very jealous of that.
@@cv507 his skin colour is black, his ethnicity is Dravidians, region of birth is south India, his nationality u.s. Is guess. His race is human. “The difference between Black and Asian” . You Mean difference between Black (decent from Africa) or Asian. /Oriëntal . India is still part of Asia.
@@se5d lol.....so apparently every dark Skin Human are of African Heritage to you? Huh? You calling us Racist, whereas you are being the ignorant one here, how's that working out for you? Say hi to your GF....she was very good
The psychiatrist with the moustache was a real psychiatrist, Brian Buss. He was my psychiatrist when I was around 18 years old. He was murdered by a "patient." And yes, those are quotation marks. Great film, though, that's for sure.
@noname I just read the article (it's online) apparently the lunatic who killed him was only admitted to the hospital in Salem, OR a few days before the killing for "depression". He was a normal guy before all that. Apparently he was having psychosis at the time, believing his was God/Christ and hearing voices/seeing things. I don't know if the guy ever got prosecuted for the crime either. Very sad story.
"Have you ever heard the old saying 'A rolling stone gathers no moss'?" "Yeah" "Does that mean something to you?" "It's the same as 'Don't wash your dirty underwear in public'" "I'm not sure I understand what you mean" Well if you're going to ask me a complete non sequiter in order to gauge my reaction is it so surprising that I would turn around and do the same?
@@AmericanIsraeliJew He was funny in the 1989 Batman movie too. His Joker character in that was what made the movie so great. Keith Ledger did a great job in the later one too. Jack Nicholson was funnier, though.
I was in the nuthouse. The question was "People that live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. What does that mean to you?" My first thought was , " You think I'm nuts?
So, Jack Napier was in Arkham even before becoming Joker. That acid didn’t drive him insane, he already was insane and the acid and the messed up surgery just made his insane inside come to the outside surface.
I read the book many years before it was made into a film. This film is the only one based on a book that is in every way equal to the book. A very unique result as usually there are ''artistic/monetary considerations'' that make the film different. I love both the book and the film equally.
I read the book a few times, loved it. Then I saw the movie and was blown away. To actually see the book on screen, specially with a great cast and directing was awesome. Kesey never saw the movie, l think he had some problems with the script not following his book.
Both are amazing, but the book is has much more incredible detail and explores the Chief's life in great depth. The movie is great, the book is a masterpiece
It was during this interview that the "C" word was used for the first time in a mainstream movie release. Randall was giving his opinion of nurse Ratched to Dr. Spivey and the other men interviewing him.
I seem to recall Elliott Gould using it in The Long Goodbye (dir. Robert Altman) in 1973, two years earlier. Marlowe was displeased with his client. Jumping on the bandwagon, Richard Gere aired it out in Days of Heaven (Terrence Malick, 1978). It is hard to dispute its considerable rhetorical power.
:13-:15 always made me LMAO!! Jack was born to play this man. Kirk Douglas was gonna play Mcmurphy. It never would’ve came off like this. Then again, guess we’ll never know.
The rolling stone gathers no moss idea was brill because it demonstrated RP's inability to see it as a metaphor for his own personality. He can only conjure up the literal translation of it. Small touch, but fascinating. The kind of thing you'd often see in Tony and Melfi's talk therapy sessions.
@@eddieingalls534 Thanks, Eddie! I don't see any advisement there. I think the nerdy guy understands what kind of person RP is and uses that line which describes him to see how RP will interpret it. Very psychologylike. The nuance of the saying, that the rolling stone is a person who gathers no ties (moss) as he moves along quickly from one thing to another, while sadly being ignorant of it. What RP comes up with is the literal translation of the phrase, but he doesn't "get" that HE is the rolling stone gathering no moss. (BTW, he plays a rolling stone character in "Five Easy Pieces" from 1970, which I recommend to you if you haven't seen it.) That answer shows that RP probably has BPD or is a narcissist to the point of mental illness. People like that have no ability to self-reflect. I don't know if either condition were listed in the DSM-1 in the early 60s, so if not, he would've been quite a confusing character. -- That nice looking blonde Dr. Collins in the Heard/Depp trial went over both of those conditions on the stand thoroughly. Amber Heard clearly has both disorders and shows in her testimony. Wow. In this Cuckoo scene, the big question among the group re RP are 50/50 on whether he's crazy. The Indian-American guy hit it on the head. "I don't think he's crazy, but I think he's quite sick." --Do you think he's dangerous? "Absolutely..." - So, long story short, to answer your question, that rolling stone question was only to see how he'd react to it. Note: RP then said, "I'm smarter than him, ain't I?" That again showed his lack of self-reflection. It was a joke, yet it still passed him by that he was more or less a fool himself and definitely not smarter than any doctor. At the Heard/Depp trial, Dr. Collins said that people w/ BPD and Histrionic PD often think they're much smarter than more educated people when they're not. I don't think the "smarter" joke was accidentally put in there because it actually demonstrates one of the personality ticks that people like Mac have.
@@eddieingalls534 Another thing I forgot to mention is that RP first says, "It's kinda like don't wash yer dirty underwear in public." Psych says, "I dunno what you mean by that." I think what MacMurphy was saying there was the rolling stone line WAS nothing more or MEANT nothing more to him personally than any other saying that he heard in his life. A lot of people with mental illness have trouble understanding idioms behind the literal meaning. To Mac, the two sayings were equivalent simply because both WERE sayings and not because they had deeper meanings. Otoh, you and I know that the rolling stone saying has a deep meaning and the underwear one doesn't. That was the first clue that it had no real meaning or connection to Mac. Then the 2nd clue came when he was pressed a little further and he explained it in a LITERAL sense, not a figurative one. The shrink's entire point was to see if he was able to understand rolling stone figuratively and also to understand that he (Mac himself) is the rolling stone.
@@nonplayerzealot4he’s not necessarily stupider than the doctors ether just because he’s not as well educated, that is a common misconception, he’s counter for the question where he explains the similarity of that expression to the one “don’t air your dirty laundry in public” showed intellect, which is why the Indian doctor smiled and nodded at him. It was clever.
The question that they asked him is an old one and basically it means nothing and its used to gauge your personality, by your answer. Because he gave a meaningless answer the psychologist didn't know what to say or how to rate score if you will his answer.
I am not very good at english. Can you please explain to me how it is meaningless to answer "Dont wash your dirty underware in public" in relation with the question " Rolling stone gathers no moss". Maybe I am stupid but I think there is a relation.
zapokaratmarat jack didn’t really understand the wisdom of the question! ; for that he gave a question back to him; therefor he kinda manipulated him and showed up as the smarter one!
@@tenja42 rolling stone gathers no moss. I think, is like saying, because you keep moving, you don't become too attached to anything. For example, too attached to a person or a place.
I want to add that if you watch the film carefully, you can see McMurphy getting shock treatment and realize they don't actually examine his brain at all which is true to psychiatry. They ("treatments") definitely affect the brain, but psychiatrists don't have any diagnostic tests that verify "healing" of the organ. And yet, people say mental illness is like any other illness. RIP Thomas Szasz
Mac would have been let out, like the rest of the "volunteers", but he simply could not and would not feign compliance to a tyrannical system that urges indifference and complacency with less than nothing.
It's his electric, magnetic smile, and his expressive face...and charisma. Jack was unable to show any self-consciousness in most of his characters. The man had IT...whatever IT is, he had it in spades.
And all he would've needed to do was to play a little ball: joke less, answer the questions with a bit more seriousness and he would've been discharged the following evening.
I saw this movie in 1970 in Miami. I decided to just go and see a movie with my girlfriend about a week before I was drafted. I would have never guessed for a million years that this was going to be on the top of the list of movies for me. It has been ...!!
Very of point and or observation.I didn't think of that until you mentioned it.He couldn't help but wish to kill the evil nurse which I guess is what sealed his death warrant
In this, we understand the prerogative. A naive emotionless construct, debilitated as such by its essence. I find potions said the wizard. As astronomers fight over the mining rights to Jupiter. We are the product, work product you’d think in terms.
Was the final scene here the reason why, as opposed to earlier plans/diagnoses, they decided to keep McMurphy in the institution? I mean, Randle seriously asks them where they suppose that woman lives!? 🤣😉 ...
