jimbo-53-186511 Robert Eroica Dupea (Jack Nicholson) is an oil rig worker who has a carefree attitude to life, his friends, his job and perhaps more importantly his girlfriend Rayette Dipesto (Karen Black). When Robert learns that his father is ill, he decides to head over and see him and at the same time he takes the opportunity to re-evaluate his life and the meaning of it...I watched this film last year, but was half asleep when I watched it and didn't really pay full attention to it. I gave it a shot again tonight in the hope that fatigue the first time around may have caused me to miss something, but nope I was right the first time. Five Easy Pieces sucks big time!!!!I'm at a loss as to where to begin with the many failings of this film; is it the giant tonal clashes from the first half of the film to the second half of the film??? The first half of the film was... well god knows what?? It was filled with some of the wackiest and most randomly nonsensical acts one could imagine - wackiness and nonsense I can handle if they serve any purpose which they don't really in this film. Then in the second half when Robert visits his dad it becomes more of a sombre mood piece and admittedly this is where the film improves marginally.When watching this film I couldn't help but be reminded slightly of the Michael Caine film called Alfie. In both films, we have a carefree and selfish bed-hopping individual whom only cares for number one. The major difference between the two films is that 'Alfie' was well-written, and the character of Alfie was fleshed out and well-developed and despite his wrongdoing it was possible to gain an understanding of his mind-set which was what really won me over with that film. In Five Easy Pieces you get none of that; Robert is an arrogant and selfish prick who despises his family and friends and goes off on psychotic rampages, but why? What causes him to behave like this? Nothing is ever explained. As a result of this, you get an unhinged crazy-assed Jack Nicholson (he puts on a good show I'll give him that), but to me it was a lot of wasted effort as I was never able to make any kind of connection with his character. The only other part of the film that resonated slightly with me lay with Robert's unrequited love with Cathy; this again mirrors what happened in Alfie and in Five Easy Pieces it's the only time that I felt that I was actually seeing the real Robert.I also felt some sympathy for Rayette - the poor girl seemed to have an IQ that was in single figures and was besotted with Robert and was completely blind to the fact that he didn't reciprocate this feeling. Alright she annoyed the hell out of me at times, but I did feel sorry for that girl.I like a good character study when it's done right, but for me this was nothing more than a boring uninvolving mess. If you want to see this sort of thing done right then watch the original Alfie with Michael Caine (for the record I haven't seen the remake with Jude Law, but I'd wager money on it being worse).

bombersflyup Five Easy Pieces isn't much of a film, despite Jack Nicholson in the main role. Robert is simply an a-hole and nothing much happens.Rayette and Catherine are the two characters which really give the film some life. The one whom Robert wants to be with and the one whom Robert is with but doesn't want to be. I can love a film where I dislike the main character, but there isn't much of a story here. That Elton character was bloody horrible, the two hitchhikers were as well and those two girls from the bowling alley, so many empty wasteful scenes. Despite all that and an unlikable main character, there was some good in it, not nearly enough though.Catherine: You're a strange person, Robert. I mean, what will you come to? If a person has no love for himself, no respect for himself, no love of his friends, family, work, something - how can he ask for love in return? I mean, why should he ask for it?

quinimdb "Five Easy Pieces" is a quiet, somber character study. It follows Bobby, a man that we first see working in an oil rig. He has a girlfriend that he can barely tolerate, but he clearly likes women and sex, and we see him cheating on his girlfriend. He is a hothead, and frequently has tantrums if he doesn't get what he wants, specifically in one scene in which he asks for lettuce and toast in a diner, but the waitress refuses, saying they don't serve that. He refuses to step down because he knows they have bread, and he continues to ask her in several different ways, until she kicks him out and he sweeps all of their glasses off of the table. Bobby is not a bad person, however. He has sympathy for others and it seems he can't seem to stand to see people suffer, even if he doesn't completely care about those people. It seems he can't stand responsibility and in one scene, he hops on the back of a storage truck with a piano while he is waiting in traffic simply because he can't stand to sit there in traffic. He wanders around for a while, not looking for anything in particular, until he ends up back with his girlfriend, who is now angry at him. This seems to be an accurate microcosm for the whole film. Bobby tries to run away from situations in which he knows that they will turn sour, which is why, as we find out, he ditched his rich family and a possible career with a piano there with them to work in an oil rig. But he's constantly moving away, because the real problem is himself. He visits his family because his father is on the verge of death, but when he sees the beautiful fiancé of his brother, he can't help but get with her. Of course she ends this before anybody finds out after a tantrum caused by a high class woman's negative comments to his brothers fiancé, as well as his sister having sex with Stoney. He clearly had hope that this could be something, but he is truly the one that ruined it for himself. He decides to leave with no goodbyes to anyone except for his sister (possibly the only member of his family he truly loves), who happens to catch him before he leaves. He is now stuck back with his girlfriend, the only person in the world who can put up with him, even though he doesn't want her to. He knows that there will be no escaping her, so when they stop at a gas station, Bobby discreetly gets into a truck hauling logs and tells the man that his car has burned up. He leaves his girlfriend to who knows where, but I believe he will only inevitably get himself into the situation again.

George Wright The character of Robert "Bobby" Dupea, performed brilliantly by Jack Nicholson, is the focus of this movie. Dupea is a character at a point in his life where he does not fit into either of two separate worlds, one is a world where he is free and the other where he is tied to his family's life of isolation, tradition and detachment. He was born with all the advantages others would envy, which he rejects for a life that his family no doubt feels is below his talents. When the show opens Bobby is living and working in an oil drilling region in Southern California. His partner is a café server named Rayette, performed by Karen Black. In that world, he hangs out with co-workers Elton and his family, where they booze, attend wild parties, go bowling and watch television. It's not a life that Bobby was born into but he can have fun with the women he seems to easily attract and not be tied down to the rigid life he knew growing up in a family of music artists. Bobby takes out his frustration on Rayette, who represents all the blue collar boredom he resents in his adopted life away from his own buttoned-up family. They have a rocky relationship in a small house where Rayette listens to country music, probably the last thing Bobby wants to listen to. When he meets up with his sister in Los Angeles, he finds out that his father has suffered two stokes. Partita, the sister, tells him to go home for a final visit.The movie then switches to an island in Puget Sound, near Seattle, where his family of professional musicians resides. His sister Partita, an accomplished pianist, lives there with the ailing father and brother Carl, played by Ralph Waite, a pleasant enough man but very stiff in the horse collar he has to wear as the result of an accident that has curtailed his career as a violinist. The whole family is stiff by Bobby's standards with the exception of his brother's fiancée Catherine, played by Susan Anspatch. Catherine is a free spirit like Bobby, who is not totally at ease in the family's isolated world in Puget Sound. Bobby charms her when he shows his talent on the piano, playing Chopin. His family's island home is presented as a dark, damp, dreary place in the movie, which fits the mood. People living here must take a ferry to the "mainland". When Rayette is here, she is like a fish out of water. A telling scene near the end with a group of family friends brings her discomfort into focus; in this encounter, Bobby shows his devotion to Raylene but the ending shows Bobby is not ready to find a direction to his life. This is a powerful movie about family, freedom, social class, and trying to find purpose in life.