Rating: 4.5/5
Criterion Challenge 2024 | 16/52 | Women Auteurs
Nicky (John Cassavetes) wakes up disheveled, glancing at the hotel room door. Slivers of newspaper cover the bed like a makeshift blanket. Half-smoked cigarettes fill the ashtray and the Coke bottle on the side table — empty cartons and trash litter the dresser.
He grabs his Fitz Colt in one hand and a bent cigarette in the other hand. The newspaper reads, “Slain Bookie Called ‘Small-Time Hood.’” He picks up the phone and gives the operator a number.
Mikey, I'm in trouble.
Nicky gives Mikey the instructions on where to meet him and how — don’t want to draw attention. Mikey (Peter Falk) arrives at the street corner, looking for Nicky, hiding in his hotel room.
Nicky throws a J&B bottle wrapped in a towel out the window to get Nicky’s attention. Perplexed in that beautiful Peter Falk way, Mikey sees the Royale Hotel across the way and enters.
Hey Nicky, it's Mikey. I came as soon as I got your towel.
Nicky tells Mikey that Nickey knows there’s a hit out for him. After 30 years of friendship, Mikey gives him an antacid and grabs some coffee. When the diner doesn’t sell cream to-go, Mikey jumps over the counter and strangles him. The lady in the background looks at the camera, unsure about what is happening.
One wild night starts with two friends - the one who messes up and who cleans up the mess. Both are oddballs with issues, but Mikey’s figured out how to keep his nose clean. If Nicky could follow Mikey’s lead, he might stay out of trouble. Or, he might die sooner.
Elaine May of the comedy duo Nichols and May doesn’t get as much attention for her directorial work as her comedy partner, Mike Nichols. Paramount’s interference with this movie resulted in a disappointing release. She even tried to hide her reels so they wouldn’t fuck up her film. The bad press kept her from directing for a decade. Her comeback movie? The infamous Ishtar.
Thankfully, Criterion remastered her director’s cut and put it in their collection because this script is so fucking funny, witty, and painful.
The most common comparison I’ve seen to this movie is Mean Streets. Mean Streets is a great movie — one of Scorsese’s best. Yet, this outshines it in every imaginable way.
We can’t choose a side so easily. At some points, Nicky seems too paranoid to bear. At others, Mikey’s weirdness makes Nicky’s paranoia feel justified. It never settles — the characters or their dynamic. Each movie moment contributes to their complicated history. Most directors would aim towards a portrait. But May errs on the side of an obfuscating stroke that keeps it ambiguous.
The pace is immaculate. The actors are incredible improvisers guided by one of the forerunners of the form. This film does the impossible and avoids the self-indulgence that plagues so many Cassavetes movies. May understands sleazy, selfish men — she came up in a circuit dominated by them. She also knows how to get these self-obsessed boys to do her script — she wrote this movie, and they did what she wrote.
A pivotal scene for me is when they see one of Nicky’s girls, Nell (Carol Grace in one of her two film roles). She’s well-read and desperate for an outlet. Mikey wants to hear her thoughts on the Indochina conflict, but Nicky won’t let her get a word in edge-wise. He laughs when she talks; he answers questions for her, and he tries to kiss her and fuck her mid-conversation.
— Don't you have any respect for me? — Sure, I do. I have plenty of respect for you. But you make it so hard for me because I like you.
But then, when it’s just Mikey and Nell, Mikey drops the pretense of hearing her thoughts and tries to kiss Nell.
I don’t love the “one wild night” schtick because it becomes an excuse for a director to throw everything at the wall and make an incoherent mess. This movie isn’t one wild night — it’s the night this friendship has been running towards for decades.