Rent Affliction (1997)

Amazing, brutal and bleak - Affliction review by CP Customer

It's a real shame films like 'Affliction' tend to get elbowed out of the way by flashy, pushy crowd pleasers lacking originality. This is a fine, well acted drama by writer director Paul Schrader, who has scripted classics such as 'Taxi Driver' and 'Raging Bull'. Nick Nolte is outstanding as Wade, a New Hampshire policeman, living in a small town where corruption is no secret and where the underhanded rule. Nolte's character starts to descend into a mental breakdown while trying to get custody of his estranged daughter and being forced to not investigate too deeply a local hunting accident. As both his professional and private life tug him in different and destructive directions, memories of childhood abuse inflicted by his father soon override his thoughts. A fine cast, Sissy Spacek, Mary Beth Hurt, Jim True and James Coburn all make this movie truly memorable. Part thriller, part psychological study, this is a great film and worth watching.

Cold Comfort in the Snow - Affliction review by griggs

In Affliction, Paul Schrader leads us through a blizzard of bitterness and regret. Nick Nolte plays a small-town cop losing his grip, haunted by family trauma and a father (James Coburn) whose cruelty still echoes through every conversation. Their scenes together feel less like dialogue and more like old wounds reopening.

Schrader adapts Russell Banks’s novel with icy precision — snowbound roads, pale light, and faces that seem carved from frost. The performances are superb, especially Coburn, who gives the film its frightening pulse. Yet for all its craft, Affliction keeps you at a distance, too bleak and restrained to fully thaw. You watch with admiration rather than involvement.

It’s a grim study of masculinity and moral decay, and it hits all the right notes. Affliction impresses more than it moves — leaving you chilled, if not entirely stirred.