AFFLICTION (70)

Directed by: Paul Schrader

Starring: Nick Nolte, James Coburn, Sissy Spacek, Willem Dafoe

The Pitch: A cop (i.e. glorified handyman) in a small New Hampshire town, fighting despair and memories of child abuse, struggles against the gradual collapse of his life.

Theo Sez: "I get to feeling like a whipped dog sometimes," says the hero of this strong, sinewy drama ; "and someday I'm going to bite back, I swear". The film comes this close to victimising him (even has him standing in the street with his arms spread out, crucified by Life), but its treatment of the abuse angle is exemplary and rather fascinating - making Coburn a malign but pathetic figure in his old age, screeching but declawed, wandering around the house like an embarrassing memory (grimacing in impotent fury when his son pins him against the wall), thus making the point that the past is past, the problem all in our hero's head : that he probably could get over his "affliction" if he wasn't the way he is. Nolte nails it gloriously - the splayed, weary walk and sudden bursts of self-destructive energy, a craggy, square-faced figure railing against "hippies" and "college boys" (much too powerful a presence to allow any pity), a man living "on the edge of his emotions", unable to see how the truth about things (whether they happened years ago or only last week) is complex and unknowable - he'll brood over lost causes (like investigating Twombly's death), build them up, invest way too much emotional capital in them, then suddenly lash out in frustration. Sharp small-town atmosphere (like the flipside of NOBODY'S FOOL), good sense of mood - even if it's only Michael Brook's plaintive score, so low in the background it feels like the air itself is vibrating. Schrader is often clumsy, minor characters (like the born-again sister) crudely drawn, script over-explicit (Nolte : "Don't you care about what's right?" ; Dafoe : "I care about the truth. I'm a student of history") ; but, a product of child abuse himself, he brings evident sincerity and a sense of personal commitment. Just the way his opening credit comes up onscreen - a moment after the voice-over says that "in telling this story I tell my own story as well" - sends a shiver down the spine.