The movie opens with Schmidt biding time on his last day of work. Alexander Payne, the director and co-screenwriter, beautifully captures the bleakness of the insurance world with carefully crafted shots of both the outside of Schmidt's company and the starkness of Schmidt's office. The screen is filled with shots of heavy-traffic carpet and desks bought at a discount office-supply warehouse. This is Warren Schmidt's universe.
As Schmidt, Nicholson uses the full range of his acting talent and does not rely on what have become his default and somewhat hackneyed expressions. In this movie, there are few cocky eyebrow raises and absolutely no suave flattery. Warren Schmidt is a person who survives on a primal desperation in such a tender depressive state that there is no room for playboy moves. Nicholson gives this movie his all by simply staring the camera down. The beautifully scripted pitfalls seem to weigh upon every wrinkle, every line of his weary face. Nicholson's eyes droop at the thought of facing another morning in the same environment, still the same man he was when he went to sleep. The poetry of Nicholson's performance is given to us reel by reel, moment by moment with such a graceful subtlety that it eases the burden of watching such a painfully disheartening movie.
As for the plot, it seems almost eclipsed by both Nicholson's nearly wordless perfomance and Payne's painstaking direction. Schmidt retires from his job as an insurance actuary at 67 only to find himself mystified by how to live his life. He cannot recollect rightly who he is nor who his wife, Helen (played artfully and convincingly by June Squibb) has become.
Misfortune strikes Warren a few weeks before his only child, Jeannie (played by the remarkable Hope Davis) is to marry a mullet-sporting waterbed salesman from Denver named Randall (Dermot Mulroney, in one of his best roles since "Lovely and Amazing"), of whom Schmidt disapproves. Deciding to leave Omaha in hopes of avoiding his miserable new life, Schmidt journeys to Denver to meet Randall's family, including his hilariously brash and blunt mother, Roberta (Kathy Bates). Randall's family is a hodgepodge of New Age hippies and silent drunks who provide the movie with most of its comic relief.
Another incident of comic drama is Schmidt's sponsorship of a destitute African youth. Before leaving Omaha, he decides to adopt a child from a telethon, and starts sending the young boy, Ndugu, $22 a month, as well as letters detailing his fears, frustrations and advice. In one letter, Schmidt reveals his naïveté of Ndogu's quality of life by recommending fraternity life to him, noting how much it meant to him in his college days.
Co-written by Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor and directed by Payne, "About Schmidt" is an extremely moving work, though at times its writers tried too hard to be meaningful. Adapted from a novel by Louis Begley, Payne and Taylor's script combines the dreariness and mundanity of ordinary suburban life with the searing complexities of dealing with human tragedy. The script never falters; it provides an astoundingly pitch-perfect view of the life of an American senior citizen in such a way that I'll certainly never be able to look at another "Over the Hill" greeting card in the same way again.
Payne's direction, however, has its faults. He spends too much time concentrating on buccolic farmlands and emotionally devoid grey buildings. Any good moviegoer can sense the importance of this film without being hit over the head in such a manner. Thanks to these exaggerated touches, the movie sometimes veers towards an overly somber, almost death-like tone.
"About Schmidt" does not feature the emotional compactness with which Payne directed his other two homages to Omaha, "Citizen Ruth" and "Election." Payne, however, still manages to make a wonderfully touching film that leaves the audience breathless. This state is not due to any of a movie's usual wrap-things-up-nicely stunts. There are no tearful reconciliations or unforseen windfalls. The utter winsomeness of this film lies in the ultimate human trick: surviving what befalls you.