DGA Monthly

6 I D G A M O N T H L Y "The first time I saw One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, I had no idea I wanted to make films," says Jean-Marc Vallée, putting his feet up and getting ready to watch it again in a New York screening room. "It didn't even feel like an influence when I first started making movies, but now, maybe with aging and many viewings, it's the kind of character- driven, transparently directed storytelling I'm aiming for, where the Director is serving the story humbly rather than showing off." Miloš Forman's 1975 DGA Award- and Oscar-winning take on Ken Kesey's novel sees R.P. McMurphy (Jack Nicholson) committed for evaluation to a mental institution under the care of Dr. Spivey (non- actor Dr. Dean R. Brooks) and Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher). "As near as I can figure out," explains McMurphy, "it's because I fight and fuck too much." When he is thrown in with the motley crew of patients and confronted with the sadistic, manipulative Ratched, McMurphy's irreverence and refusal to fall in line inspires all the inmates, but not without tragic consequences. Though most of the action takes place in the hospital, the film opens with a distant car approaching through a mountainous landscape at dawn, with a haunting score underlain by Native American percussion. "It's calm and quiet, and makes you wonder what kind of film you're watching," says Vallée, settling into his seat. "What's the link between the car, this beautiful nature, and this strange score? No idea at this point, but we'll find out later that it's connected to the Indian character, Chief Bromden [Will Sampson]—it's his landscape and he'll run to it at the end. "This whole sequence introduces the world objectively until McMurphy arrives and Forman embraces his point of view," continues Vallée. "The car passes and then he cuts inside to the hospital, dollying past patients in bed, introducing Nurse Ratched with a head-to-toe long shot, walking toward the camera, jangling her keys as she arrives from behind what looks like a prison door. She unlocks it and closes it, Bang! Sounds like a prison door, too. Then three orderlies greet her, 'Good morning, Miss Ratched,' pronouncing her name one after the other. So we get it; she's the boss." "Medication time," a nurse's voice pipes into the ward, and the shot cuts to a record needle dropping onto a 45. A light waltz now accompanies the patients accepting their pills, one by one from the nurses' station, as Forman introduces them. "Such odd and amazing faces," says Vallée. "What casting. I like that Forman is using source music to introduce a theme and ritual associated with the hospital, and not score. We'll hear it again and again, with the needle going down, as a leitmotif, from the Director's point of view, as if he wanted to tell us that this is not his choice of music but the institution's. This music is from their world. The way it's mixed makes it sound like it's coming from the room. It would have sounded too judgmental if it was coming from the filmmaker. Miloš is credible from beginning to end. Look at how natural the lighting is. Not once does it attract our attention to where it feels like film lighting. The source feels like it's always coming from outside of the room or from fluorescents above." When McMurphy is led into the rotunda in cuffs, Forman cuts to his POV of the balconies and the patients wandering around. "It's the first time Miloš is embracing a character's point of view, telling us it's going to be McMurphy's story," says Vallée, as McMurphy is led through the same door and hall where Ratched was introduced. "He doesn't embrace Nurse Ratched's. Forman dollies back with McMurphy, [whereas] he let Ratched walk to camera. It says, he's our guy." Vallée responds again to what he considers the modesty of Forman's direction, this time with McMurphy sitting across a desk from Dr. Spivey in his office. This November marks the 50th Anniversary of the release of Miloš Forman's DGA Award-winning classic, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. We look back at how the film influenced the late Director Jean-Marc Vallée. S C R E E N I N G R O O M Mind Games In this reprint from DGA Quarterly, we rewind to 2014 when Director Jean-Marc Vallée spoke about how Miloš Forman's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest emphasized performance over style. by Rob Feld HEAD CASE: Jean-Marc Vallée appreciates the humor of Forman's direction as McMurphy (Jack Nicholson) faces off with the doctor in charge. ON THE SET: Miloš Forman directing Jack Nicholson in a scene for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

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