1997 was the first year that I really started paying attention to the Oscars. I had always been big into the movies and had watched the broadcast before, but I had never really seriously looked at the movies that were getting nominations before. The last time I had even been aware of the Oscar drama between movies was when Forrest Gump, Pulp Fiction, and The Shawshank Redemption were battling it out in 1994. Titanic changed things for me, though, and I went into the 1997 Oscars having seen all five of the Best Picture nominees. I read articles where people argued this movie winning over that one ad nauseam, but anyone pushing for something other than Titanic winning was kidding themselves. It made for an uneventful evening because we all knew who was going to win. That didn’t stop me from making sure I knew the other four films nominated.
To be fair, it was a strong year for the movies, and any one of the other four nominations could have won had it not been for James Cameron’s juggernaut epic. This includes the oddly fascinating romantic comedy As Good As It Gets, an atypical love story that goes to unexpected places on its journey to the inevitable finale. This film, a reunion for producer/director James L. Brooks and actor Jack Nicholson, caught people off-guard with its acerbic dialogue and frank depictions of personality disorders and the realities of everyday life. It also had a homosexual character who was not depicted as a stereotypical comedic sidekick, a refreshing change of pace from how they were often handled in entertainment at the time. This movie was so well put together that it is a crime how little it won at the Oscars that year. We can blame most of that, of course, on Titanic.
The film can be used as a screenwriting study for how to effectively establish characters and relationships without resorting to telling us how they all fit together. Within roughly the first ten minutes, we understand all of the principal characters and how they interact with each other. Jack Nicholson, playing Melvin Udall, is giving us the same, slightly askew, and crotchety performance he often did, but there is another side to him that shows that underneath all of that, there is more going on than just a bitter, anti-social man who hates nearly everyone and can’t, or won’t, pretend otherwise. The one exception in his life is Carol Connelly (Helen Hunt), a waitress at a restaurant he goes to every day for breakfast. This ritual is very important to him, so much so that if she is not there, he loses control of himself. He has to sit at the same table, too, and brings his own plastic flatware.
Carol is a single mom living with her mother and raising a young son with a lot of health issues that she cannot afford to properly take care of on her waitressing salary. This has put a damper on her social life, becoming a major turnoff for any dates she tries to bring home. It also frequently leaves her exhausted, especially when her son, Spencer (Jesse James), has an attack in the middle of the night. This struggle has put her in a position where she may have to find a different job closer to home so she can better take care of him.
Melvin’s neighbor, Simon Bishop (Greg Kinnear), is a gay artist who has recently begun a series of drawings of a new model, Vincent (Skeet Ulrich). Vincent uses the modeling sessions to case out the apartment and, later, sneak in some friends to rob the place. When Simon catches them in the act, they assault him, leaving him hospitalized, unable to work, and drowning in medical debt. Because of this, and also a poor reception at his latest gallery, Simon is broke and is facing losing everything. Simon and Melvin have a confrontational relationship, with Melvin especially disliking Simon’s dog, Verdell, who is in the habit of urinating in the hallways of their apartment floor. The film opens with Melvin catching Verdell mid-peeing and placing him in the garbage chute. Later, Frank Sachs (Cuba Gooding Jr.), Simon’s agent, will force Melvin into babysitting the dog while Simon recovers in the hospital as payment for trying to dispose of the dog in the first place.
All of this character dynamic we get in the first ten minutes of the film. This is an amazingly taught and well-written screenplay that should have won the Oscar that year. Instead, newcomers Ben Affleck and Matt Damon won out with their college drama Good Will Hunting, which was also being heralded for just how good a film it was. Of course, even the best scripts are indebted to the actors who bring the words to life, and As Good As It Gets is no exception. All three of the leads are just spot-on and got their own Oscar nominations, two of them winning. Greg Kinnear couldn’t quite beat out the insanely brilliant dramatic performance Robin Williams gave in Good Will Hunting; nobody was going to beat that one out that year.
About halfway through the film, it shifts gears and becomes a bit of a road movie. Melvin, who is a famous professional writer of romantic fiction, pulls some strings to get Spencer a real doctor to take care of him at no cost to his mother. Simon, in desperation, needs to go home to his parents and ask for financial assistance to get back on his feet. He also needs to find the motivation to create art again. Since he cannot drive alone, Melvin, once again coerced by Frank Sachs, is to drive him to Baltimore to see his parents. Melvin insists that Carol chaperone them on the two-day round trip and, because of the generous assistance he is providing her for her son, feels that she owes him to come along. This trip will prove to be inspiring for all involved and will take things to some unexpected places before all is said and done.
Jack Nicholson seems tailor-made to play these kinds of roles. This is Jack Torrance and R. P. McMurphy all rolled into one. But if that were all that it was, then this wouldn’t have gotten the accolades that it did. After all, being grumpy and sarcastic is something he could play in his sleep. It’s far more interesting watching Jack during the moments when he knows he has stepped over the line and has been called out for it. Early on, he makes an offhand, and very mean-spirited, quip about Carol’s son: “Oh, we’re all going to die soon. I will, you will, and it sure sounds like your son will.” Naturally, that hits her hard, and she is barely holding back her rage, her fear, and her disbelief that he could say such a thing when she responds: “If you ever mention my son again, you will never be able to eat here anymore…” Melvin is cowed and can barely respond. He knows what he said and that he has stepped over the line. He didn’t intend to upset her, but he cannot help speaking without thinking first.
That’s not to say there aren’t times when he deliberately uses his acerbic tongue to offend. He refers to Frank Sachs as “that colored man,” uses offensive terminology in reference to Simon being gay, and makes many racist comments about a Jewish couple just because they happen to be sitting at his booth in the restaurant. He is a genuinely unpleasant individual that we would almost certainly hate were it not for the absolute charisma of Jack Nicholson, who is doing his best to show us that Melvin is not entirely an unlikable person.
And this brings us to the romance part of the story. Anyone looking for a “luvy duvy boy meets girl” story is not going to find it here. This is not one of those cookie-cutter romances that Doris Day and Rock Hudson used to churn out in the 1960s. This is a story about two very different people who have some very real-world problems and how they are able to complement each other in a very unique way. This is beautifully, and hilariously, represented in the dinner scene when Melvin tries to give Carol a compliment. It’s awkward, yet sincere, and she tells him so. Things go off the rails, though, when she puts him on the spot, asking him why he asked her to come on the trip to Baltimore. He cannot handle that question, and his response is perhaps the worst thing he could have possibly said. That he eventually recovers from that conversation is an absolute miracle. His assertion that she makes him want to be a better person is accurate, however, and we see that with how he handles taking care of Simon when his condo is taken away from him. The Melvin in the first half of the film would have never done what he does in the end of it.
Simon has his own character arch, too. He has a troubled relationship with his father and his injury does not change that. When he is finally able to get his mother on the phone and talk to her it is obvious that things have not softened between him and his father. Earlier in the film, as Simon is trying to sketch Vincent for the first time, he explains to the young man about how inspiration strikes him by just seeing someone out in the world and watching them until he’s hit with a real feeling of their humanity. After the assault he can’t bring himself to create art, anymore, and that is part of the reason he’s so depressed. Later, during the road trip, Helen comes into his room after the disastrous dinner with Melvin, wanting to avoid him and needing someone to talk to. After a short while that inspiration hits Simon again, the life comes back into his face and he simply must draw her. It’s the first time we see a smile on his face since the assault, and once that is there, we know that, money or not, he is going to be alright.
This is an actor’s movie, and the final result speaks for itself. As I write this, I am reminded that in 2026, there will be a new award at the Oscars for Best Cast. As Good As It Gets would have qualified for that award had it been available in 1997. This is a tremendous cast working with an amazingly well-written script to create a truly moving film that is funny, intentionally cringeworthy at times, and honest in its raw emotions. It’s a romantic comedy, but it is proof that that genre isn’t always mindless sappy melodrama meant to appeal to the hopelessly romantic. This is a smart movie that will charm you while it is weaving a complex relationship drama. Before this was released, I would have never been able to picture Jack Nicholson in a relationship with Helen Hunt, and if I had, I would be picturing an odd-couple type pairing. We get some of that, but Jack and Helen are so good that they make it work, and now I cannot picture anyone else being in these roles. She makes him want to be a better person, and in the end, he kind of is.
Academy Award Nominations:
Best Picture: James L. Brooks, Bridget Johnson, and Kristi Zea
Best Actor: Jack Nicholson (won)
Best Actress: Helen Hunt (won)
Best Supporting Actor: Greg Kinnear
Best Original Screenplay: Mark Andrus and James L. Brooks
Best Film Editing: Richard Marks
Best Original Score: Hans Zimmer
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Release Date: December 25, 1997
Running Time: 139 Minutes
Rated PG-13
Starring: Jack Nicholson, Helen Hunt, Greg Kinnear, Cuba Gooding Jr., Skeet Ulrich, and Shirley Knight
Directed By: James L. Brooks
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