Frost/Nixon (R, 2008)

Director Ron Howard (working off a script penned by The Queen's Peter Morgan) keeps a steady hand at the tiller, balancing wonky political material with finely tuned dramatic pacing and framing. FROST/NIXON sets up the talks as if they were a boxing match, with Frost as the charismatic but overwhelmed fighter in one corner, and Nixon morphing from cautious and confident to cornered in the other. It's a power face-off, and Frost seems poised for victory. But is it a victory when your opponent allows you to punch him right on the nose? Or is it his victory for choosing to lose? As depicted, the interview humanizes Nixon, and the nation finally gets a denouement -- thanks to him. And Nixon, in the end, gets his "way back into the sun," if only briefly. It's no neat conclusion, but the film smartly embraces the ambiguity, which makes it appealing ... and frustrating. Despite two hours of hearing the two men talk, we know neither of them (nor their motivations) convincingly.

Langella deserves the kudos that critics began heaping on him when he first took on the role in the stage play on which the film is based. His Nixon isn't an exact facsimile but rather a weathered, haunting, hulking impression. As Frost, Sheen is on the nose, as is Kevin Bacon as Nixon's earnest protector, Jack Brennan. But Rebecca Hall is mere window dressing as Frost's girlfriend, there to amuse the president ever so briefly (she's charming, but the distraction diminishes the film's impact slightly). And while the embellishments in the storytelling may have political history aficionados crying foul, they make for fine drama.