Ten Best Jack Nicholson Movies

Jack Nicholson in Chinatown (1974), lobby card image courtesy Heritage Auction Galleries

Jack Nicholson was born John Joseph Nicholson in Neptune, New Jersey, on April 22, 1937. Nicholson made his motion picture debut in The Cry Baby Killer (1958), playing the title role of juvenile delinquent Jimmy Wallace. 

Here are ten movies that no Jack Nicholson fan should ever miss. Can you handle the truth?

Chinatown (Paramount, 1974)

Jack Nicholson plays J.J. “Jake” Gittes, a Los Angeles private eye who in the course of a routine adultery case uncovers big time government corruption involving water rights and a proposed dam. Nicholson is in absolutely top form, playing a former L.A. Chinatown beat cop whose nose for trouble lands him in hot water in the City of Angels, including a nasty encounter with a knife-wielding hood who plants his shiv up Nicholson’s meddlesome sniffer. Set in 1937, Chinatown is a classic film noir thriller, with Faye Dunaway, John Huston and Diane Ladd along for the wild ride.

• Academy Award nomination for Best Actor
• Great Nicholson line: “Mrs. Mulwray, I goddamn near lost my nose. And I like it. I like breathing through it.”
• Director: Roman Polanski
• On DVD: Chinatown Special Collector’s Edition (Paramount, 2007)

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (United Artists, 1975)

Jack Nicholson stars as R.P. McMurphy, a career criminal who waggles his way into a mental hospital in order to win some easier time on his sentence. Nicholson’s McMurphy is a rebellious lot, challenging hospital rules and taking on the dictatorial Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher). One of the more memorable scenes is McMurphy’s unauthorized social outing, whereby he commandeers a bus and takes his fellow patients on a deep sea fishing excursion. But McMurphy’s high-spirited shenanigans eventually lead to his demise when a lobotomy is performed, with the camera zooming in on the telltale surgical scar now adorning his head. William Redfield, Brad Dourif, Will Sampson, Danny DeVito and Christopher Lloyd also appear in this Best Picture Oscar winner.

• Academy Award nomination for Best Actor (won)
• Great Nicholson line: “I must be crazy to be in a loony bin like this.”
• Director: Milos Forman
• On DVD: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest Two-Disc Special Edition (Warner, 2002)

Five Easy Pieces (Columbia, 1970)

Jack Nicholson plays Robert Eroica Dupea, a former child prodigy/classical pianist who now works on the big oil rigs. When his alienated father becomes ill, Nicholson’s Bobby Dupea heads home to Seattle with his pregnant girlfriend Rayette Dipesto (Karen Black) in tow. Five Easy Pieces is a period film, exploring American culture of the 1960s and early ’70s, with Nicholson delivering one of the finest character studies of his career. The famous diner scene is legendary, with Nicholson sparring with a waitress (Lorna Thayer) as he tries to order a simple piece of plain toast.

• Academy Award nomination for Best Actor
• Great Nicholson line (to the snooty waitress, who asks: “You want me to hold the chicken, huh?”): “I want you to hold it between your knees.”
• Director: Bob Rafelson
• On DVD: Five Easy Pieces (Columbia Tristar, 1999)

The Last Detail (Columbia, 1973)

Jack Nicholson stars as Billy “Bad Ass” Buddusky, a career Navy man who garners a Shore Patrol assignment to escort a young sailor (Randy Quaid) from Norfolk, Virginia, to the naval prison at Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Along with fellow “lifer” Mule Mulhall (Otis Young), Nicholson’s Buddusky sets out with Quaid in tow, showing the kid a good time before he hits the hellish confines of Portsmouth and the tough marine grunts who run it. “‘Maggot’ this, ‘maggot’ that…marines are really assholes, you know that? It takes a certain kind of a sadistic temperament to be a marine,” the salty Nicholson offers, betting that the kid won’t last even close to eight years in the military slammer.

• Academy Award nomination for Best Actor
• Great Nicholson line: “Heinekin? Why it’s the finest beer in the world! President Kennedy used to drink it!”
• Director: Hal Ashby
• On DVD: The Last Detail (Columbia Tristar, 1999)

The Last Detail 1973 one sheet movie poster image courtesy Heritage Auction Galleries

The Shining (Warner Bros., 1980)

Jack Nicholson plays Jack Torrance, a recovering alcoholic schoolteacher-turned-aspiring writer who takes a job as the winter caretaker at Colorado’s Overlook Hotel. Nicholson gives a tour de force performance, battling both his own inner demons as well as the haunted hotel’s supernatural stiffs. Old Jack eventually snaps, slaying Good Samaritan chef Dick Halloran (Scatman Crothers) and going after his wife and young son (Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd) with an axe in hand and murder in his eye. Chopping his way into a bathroom, the leering Nicholson sticks his head in and mouths his famous line, “Heeeeere’s Johnny!”  – and boy, he isn’t kidding.

• Great Nicholson line (to Joe Turkel’s Lloyd, the ghostly bartender who asks what he’s drinking tonight): “Hair of the dog that bit me, Lloyd.”
• Director: Stanley Kubrick
• On DVD: The Shining Two-Disc Special Edition (Warner, 2007)

A Few Good Men (Columbia, 1992)

Jack Nicholson plays Colonel Nathan R. Jessep, the Marine commander at Guantanamo Bay who locks horns with Navy defense attorney Lt. (j.g.) Daniel Kaffee (Tom Cruise). Nicholson’s Col. Jessep had secretly ordered an illegal Code Red, resulting in the death of Private William T. Santiago (Michael DeLorenzo). Lt. Kaffee, along with Lt. Commander JoAnne Galloway (Demi Moore) and Lt. Sam Weinberg (Kevin Pollak), are tasked with defending the two young marines charged with Santiago’s murder. The main action takes place in the courtroom, where Tom Cruise tries to break the cocky, defiant Nicholson on the witness stand. 

• Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor
• Great Nicholson line (to Cruise’s Lt. Kaffee): “I run my unit how I run my unit. You want to investigate me, roll the dice and take your chances. I eat breakfast 300 yards from 4,000 Cubans who are trained to kill me, so don’t think for a second that you can come down here, flash your badge and make me nervous.”
• Director: Rob Reiner
• On DVD: A Few Good Men Special Edition (Columbia Tristar, 2001)

Easy Rider (Columbia, 1969)

Jack Nicholson, in his breakthrough film, plays alcoholic lawyer George Hanson, who escapes his small town and heads south to Mardi Gras with hippie bikers Wyatt (Peter Fonda) and Billy (Dennis Hopper). Nicholson is a riot to watch, playing a hardcore boozer who takes his first hit of marijuana while out on the road. “Lord have mercy! Is that what that is?” Nicholson declares, spying the joint. Mad Jack roaring down the highway clad in his old football helmet is the stuff of movie legend.

• Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor
• Great Nicholson line: “They’ll talk to ya and talk to ya and talk to ya about individual freedom. But they see a free individual, it’s gonna scare ‘em.”
• Director: Dennis Hopper
• On DVD: Easy Rider Special Edition (Columbia Tristar, 2002)

Jack Nicholson and Peter Fonda in Easy Rider (1969), lobby card image courtesy Heritage Auction Galleries

As Good As It Gets (TriStar, 1997)

Jack Nicholson plays Melvin Udall, a bigoted New York City romance novelist whose OCD drives people crazy. Nicholson’s Udall becomes involved in the lives of his gay neighbor artist Simon Bishop (Greg Kinnear) and single mom waitress Carol Connelly (Helen Hunt), with comic results. Nicholson carries much of the movie with his rants and various obsessions, but his character is open to a little romance as well, which he finally achieves with the much younger Helen Hunt.  

• Academy Award nomination for Best Actor (won)
• Great Nicholson line (to Simon’s dog Verdell, sending him down a garbage chute): “This is New York, pal. If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere!”
• Director: James L. Brooks
• On DVD: As Good As It Gets (Columbia/Tristar, 1998)

Ironweed (TriStar, 1981)

Jack Nicholson portrays Francis Phelan, an ex-baseball player who drowns his troubles in booze during the Great Depression. Nicholson’s interplay with fellow drunk Helen Archer (Meryl Streep) is a work of art, with the two feeding their addiction at seedy gin mills like Oscar Reo’s. The scene where locals drive the homeless people out of Albany, New York, with baseball bats is brutal, making Ironweed one of Nicholson’s roughest films.

• Academy Award nomination for Best Actor
• Great Nicholson line: “Goddamn dead men, traveling around together.”
• Director: Hector Babenco
• On DVD: Ironweed (Lion’s Gate, 2009)

The Missouri Breaks (United Artists, 1976)

Jack Nicholson plays Tom Logan, a horse thief who’s pursued by wily bounty hunter Robert E. Lee Clayton (Marlon Brando). This offbeat western is a sleeper in the Jack Nicholson filmography, with both Nicholson and Brando delivering fine performances as Old West anti-heroes. Brando’s choice of weapon – a combination harpoon/mace – only enhances the proceedings in this violent oater as he picks off Nicholson’s gang one by one. The Missouri Breaks may have been a box office failure, but don’t blame Nicholson.

• Great Nicholson line: “The closer you get to Canada, the more things’ll eat your horse.”
• Director: Arthur Penn
• On DVD: The Missouri Breaks (MGM, 2005)

Ten More Jack Nicholson Movie Gems

• The King of Marvin Gardens (1972)
• The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981)
• Reds (1981)
• Terms of Endearment (1983)
• Prizzi’s Honor (1985)
• Batman (1989)
• The Two Jakes (1990)
• Hoffa (1992)
• Anger Management (2003)
• The Bucket List (2007)