"Five Easy Pieces" is one of the greatest films of the 70's and contains one of Jack Nicholson's greatest performances. Nicholson stars as Bobby Dupea, a conflicted, complex man who has abandoned the values of his upbringing to live a life of humble squalor and dead-end oil rig jobs in California. He is a man who is not functioning at his highest potential and lives his life among working-class, uneducated people who don't stimulate him intellectually. His girlfriend Rayette (Karen Black) is likeable but dim-witted. He is attached to her in a way but we are constantly aware of his discomfort and ambivalence about being with her.
Eventually, Bobby learns that his father back home has suffered a stroke and his sister tells him it would be nice if he could come home to see him and his family one last time. So, with some reluctance, Bobby decides to make the trek up north with Rayette at his side to pay his respects. The Dupea family is no ordinary family, they are group of accomplished musicians and prodigious piano players who live in an isolated existence somewhere in the country-side of Washington State. There is a jarring difference in the cinematography and mise-en-scene of the two locales. The road-trip in between slices the film into two distinct halves.
"Five Easy Pieces" represents the mind-set of the post-sixties ex-flower-child. The drifting, aimless, vagabond lifestyle expressed by Bobby Dupea reflects the zeitgeist of the approaching 70's and the disillusionment felt by many at the crossroads of two distinct eras. It is a moving portrait of a fractured time in American history and speaks volumes of the spirit of the post-60's baby boomer. It features an unforgettable, heart-rending performance by Nicholson and a gripping story.
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