Critic's Grade: A+

Warren Schmidt isn't anyone special, despite what his former coworkers might try to instill in him at his retirement party from Woodsmen of the World Insurance Co. At the age of 66, he has now chosen to leave the work force, ready to embrace the world of easy living in Omaha, Nebraska through pension funds and social security that he has spent his entire life working for.

Suddenly, he's in a world he cannot remember. His wife, Helen, seems more like a stranger than the woman he's spent 42 years of married life with; her attempts to liven up what she calls the "next chapter" in their lives have little effect on Warren, who seems to wallow in a post-retirement haze where nothing has any meaning. He is slowly beginning to learn that through years and years of business, marraige, and fatherhood, he has gained nothing from which to benefit after all of that has passed him by.

"About Schmidt," with its subtle examinations of life in the suffocating trenches of mid-to-upper-class suburbia, is a life lesson dressed in some of the year's most genuinely affecting comedy, touching moments that resonate within the soul long after the film has ended, and a stand-out performance from the ever-forceful Jack Nicholson, who relinquishes those talents with which he shaped his usual onscreen persona, and becomes a man who is lost in a world which now seems to hold no meaning for him. The key to comprehending the movie is through a complete understanding of Schmidt, and Nicholson, along with co-writer/director Alexander Payne and co-writer Jim Taylor, give us just that and then some.

There is a conflict within the movie that comes after a surprising plot twist which I will not reveal here (I'm only shocked the previews kept it a secret), involving the engagement of Warren's daughter, Jeannie (Hope Davis), to Randall Hertzel (Dermot Mulroney), a hillbilly waterbed salesman from Denver in whom Warren sees nothing but trouble. His sudden willingness to become involved in Jeannie's life stems from his desperation to make a difference in her decisions, to try and lean upon her some type of knowledge, even if it's as risky as telling her she's making the biggest mistake of her life.

This leads to his venturing to Denver just days before the wedding, where he meets the highly dysfunctional Hertzel clan, headed (or lorded over, whichever you like) by Roberta (Kathy Bates). The purpose of this section of the film is basically comic relief on the part of two veteran actors who know their characters and become them; after all, given the fact that the wedding "goes off without a hitch," Warren's efforts in terms of changing his daughter's mind are fruitless. This portion of the material is all about Nicholson and Bates, especially Bates, who is so candid in her delivery of dialogue concerning Roberta's "lust" for life (literally) that she brings down the house. Nicholson is at his most charming here, as Warren is cast into a setting he cannot relate to, and does not want to, but does so according to his daughter's wishes. Go ahead and try to think of a scene in any movie from 2002 funnier than that of Warren hyped up on Percodan.

All of this is guided by a narration-like presence of his letters to Ndugu, an African child he has recently sponsored for $22 a month. While these letters do retain much of the humor of Warren's views on his own life, they are also very sorrowful in their realization that his life has been nothing more than routines and duties. They bring us into the mind of the character in such a way that we welcome the feeling of knowing his personal thoughts, which bring us joy and sadness simultaneously.

When the movie was over, a discussion with a friend led to the question of why there was very little of the relationship between Warren and Jeannie, or any of the other characters, for that matter. I think that Payne and Taylor have done right not to dive into the past between father and daughter, and by giving us mere surface images of those that surround Warren. The fragile first-person point-of-view requires that we see things the same way as the main character; tampering with things like interpersonal relationships and side-stories would altogether provide for too many awkward moments where we don't know who to sympathize with. In scenes involving Jeannie's disagreements with her father, we have no choice but to see things from Warren's side, because he is the one calling all the shots here.

This intimate association with the character of Warren Schmidt not only gives us some very funny moments, but some very powerful ones as well. Throughout the movie, Warren is constantly in search of something that even he himself knows nothing of. He realizes that his life has had no meaning for him, no bearing on the lives and actions of those around him, and no overall purpose with which he will be associated once he is gone from this world. There is a single moment at the very end of the film, one of the most definitive realizations in all of cinema, in which Warren finally gets the answer to his most troubling question: "Who have I helped?"

The overall movie works for two mains reasons: Nicholson and Payne. As an actor, Jack has always been the one true master at wit and charm; anyone who doesn't believe me hasn't seen his performance in "As Good as It Gets." Here, he leaves this and his other trademarks for a role that requires very little of him, and yet so much of him, and he locates this delicate balance and masters it in one breathtaking, powerhouse piece of acting. As the director, Payne keeps things as they should be: the first-person viewpoint, the humor, the poignant vignettes of everyday life, all conspire to create something lyrical, magical, and most of all, real. "About Schmidt" relates to its audiences in ways that few movies have ever achieved; for anyone searching for a sense of purpose, your film has arrived.

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