One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Review

Forman filmed at Oregon State Hospital with real staff in supporting roles, and the ordinariness of the setting is what makes the picture bite. Haskell Wexler's camera stays plain and close, favoring long lenses that isolate faces in group therapy, so the ward reads as a place rather than a metaphor. Nicholson gives one of the great American performances by refusing to play McMurphy as a martyr; he is a loud, self-interested chancer whose gift is contagious appetite, and the invented World Series broadcast, narrated at a blank television screen until the whole ward is on its feet, is the film's thesis in three minutes.

Louise Fletcher's counterweight is astonishing because it is so small. Nurse Ratched never bullies, she merely applies procedure with unhurried courtesy, which is precisely why the ward cannot beat her. Brad Dourif's Billy and Will Sampson's Chief supply the two devastating final movements. The photography is functional rather than expressive, and it is the only ordinary thing in the film.