Thoughts on the “The Assassination of Richard Nixon” movie

Thanks to Cinema Seattle I was able to see a preview screening of the new Sean Penn movie, The Assassination of Richard Nixon.  Sean Penn does a great job in this film and he really pulls you into his character.  As always I am never good about keeping the plot points of the movie from my comments so what follows will most likely contain spoilers.
The Assassination of Richard Nixon is based on true life events in 1974.  I have no idea if it is loosely or tightly based however, but it is the story of Sam Bicke (Sean Penn) who is a man where everything is just going wrong in his life as all he wants to do is live the American dream.  He hates his job as a salesman because he can never “lie” to his customers.  He is separated from his wife (Naomi Watts) and while she has started to move on with her life he is still holding out hope that they will get back together.  He is trying to create a business of his own with his best friend played by Don Cheadle but his hopes of a small business loan are dashed in what he blames is that the government is racist.  You really start to feel for Sam and his plight.  In the end Sam has had enough and he feels that a lone man in the world can make a difference and should be remembered.  His plan is to get back that the government by hijacking a plane and crashing it into the White House and in the process kill Richard Nixon.  He tells the story of who he is to musician Leonard Bernstein via recorded tapes that he sends before he gets on the plane.  I wish I knew more about his music but I imagine the musical score we a lot of his work or at least based on it.  I should say that the end of the film is surpassingly shocking, not to me but to many people on the audience.  The amount of blood and guts from gun shots was a lot for many people to take.
I think that as a dark drama this is worth seeing.  Sean Penn seems to almost get better in his acting the more he does.  I enjoyed his acting in this movie.. 

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