'McCARTHY AT HOLLYWOOD AND VINE' (Episode #124)

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[FUN FACT: This "review" was originally published at Amazon.com in 2006, when Hillary Clinton was making noise about running for the 2008 Presidential election. In the comment section, a liberal woman named Joan M. Padilla excoriated me for using a masterpiece movie like '...Cuckoo's Nest' as political propaganda. She concluded her angry rant by stating that she hoped Hillary Clinton WOULD get me and all of my "ferret faced fascist friends". I complimented Joan on her comment, because that alliterative expression cracked me up, and it later became the inspiration for the title of my politically incorrect blog 'Ferret-Faced Fascist Friends' found (link:] HERE.]
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ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST
directed by Milos Forman; starring Jack Nicholson
1975
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{*Note: spoiler alert*}
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INTERVIEWER: Hello, and welcome back to McCARTHY AT HOLLYWOOD AND VINE. We’re here today with Stephen T. McCarthy and discussing one of his very favorite films, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. Tell us, Stephen, when did you first see this highly acclaimed film?
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McCARTHY: CUCKOO’S NEST was released in nineteen seventy-five, and I saw it numerous times at The Avco Cinema Center in Los Angeles. I and a group of friends –- some who later went on to become police officers -– sneaked into the theatre repeatedly during its initial run. To this day, it remains entrenched on my all-time Top Ten movie list.
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INTERVIEWER: Stephen, you little criminal, we never would have thought it of you! I understand that you have a rather original perspective on this classic film. Want to share that with us?
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McCARTHY: Well, back in seventy-five, I thought I was just viewing a magnificently crafted and masterfully acted film centered on the important theme of individualism and finding and being true to one’s own "voice". I had no way of knowing that the movie was actually remarkably prescient with regards to the American political situation that would manifest over thirty years later.
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INTERVIEWER: Would you care to elaborate?
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McCARTHY: To the viewer in nineteen seventy-five, this movie, which won five Academy Awards, appeared to tell the story of a man who feigns mental illness in order to avoid his prison work detail. While he is undergoing psychiatric evaluation, his rebellious, individualistic spirit “infects” the real “nut cases” who begin to assert themselves much to the resentment of the domineering head nurse at the mental institution. But here in Aught Six, we can see that the movie was actually foretelling the political situation that this country now finds itself in.
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INTERVIEWER: To you, the characters in this movie represent something completely different, don’t they?
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McCARTHY: Yes. Actually, CUCKOO’S NEST is about the 2008 Presidential Election. The mental institution itself symbolizes the United States -– a loony bin if there ever was one. The domineering, manipulative, and vindictive head nurse, Mildred Ratched, represents Hillary Clinton –- a power-hungry woman driven by her insatiable quest for control. It should be pointed out that Louise Fletcher won an Oscar for her remarkable portrayal of Mrs. Clinton. Capturing every aspect of the senator’s traits, she paints us as good a portrait of Clinton as Clinton herself could have done.
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INTERVIEWER: But the senator’s road to The White House is not without obstacles, is it?
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McCARTHY: No. Standing in her way is the rebellious underdog, Randle Patrick McMurphy, a man who seeks to bring the nuts around him back to their senses. McMurphy personifies the true American spirit opposed to the Socialism of Nurse Ratched.
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There is one scene in particular that forcefully illustrates this friction: McMurphy petitions to have the television in the community room turned on so that he and his fellow Americans –- or “the mental defective league”, as he accurately refers to them -- can watch the second game of the 1963 World Series. Baseball, being “America’s Pastime”, is naturally repugnant to the Leftist Nurse, and so she resorts to her unique brand of sophism in order to prevent genuinely American traditions from being broadcasted into the community (room).
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INTERVIEWER: And Nurse Ratched is aided and abetted by--
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McCARTHY: She is voted into power and protected by women and minorities. This is conveyed by her ever-present subordinate female nurse and by the mental institution’s watchful and protective Black orderlies. Ratched’s eventual success in quashing all sense of individualism and driving the country deeper into the pit of Socialism is “shockingly” revealed in the eventual castration of America’s spirit, that being R.P. McMurphy. The symbolic castration, however, is thinly veiled by the fact that the scalpel is actually wielded against his “Northern” hemisphere.
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INTERVIEWER: Is there no happy ending here?
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McCARTHY: No, I’m afraid not. With the true American spirit now impotent, Mrs. Clinton occupies the ultimate position of power that she coveted, and the principles of Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and George Mason -– those formerly enduring ideals NATIVE to America –- “fly the coop”, or leave the cuckoo’s nest. This is represented by the “Native American”, Chief Bromden, who heads for the hills.
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INTERVIEWER: And isn’t it true that--  Hey, wait, Stephen, where are you going?!
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McCARTHY: To pack my bags! I’m afraid that Nurse Ratched really is going to win the 2008 election, and I also need to be ready to escape this insane country and “head for the hills.”
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~ Stephen T. McCarthy
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