Movies aren't really like this anymore. Honestly, looking back at 1997, it’s wild to think a major studio put so much money behind a movie where the lead character is, for the first hour, almost entirely irredeemable. James L. Brooks has this specific knack for making you sit in the discomfort of human awfulness until it starts to feel like empathy. That is the magic of the As Good as It Gets movie. It doesn't use the typical "meet-cute" tropes that plague the genre. Instead, it gives us a man with severe, untreated Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) who hurls bigoted insults at his neighbors and literally drops a dog down a trash chute.
You’ve probably seen the memes of Jack Nicholson’s Melvin Udall walking through the streets of Manhattan, meticulously avoiding the cracks in the pavement. It looks quirky. In the context of the film, though, it’s a prison.
The film isn't just a vehicle for Nicholson to chew the scenery, though he does that better than anyone else alive. It’s a messy, loud, and surprisingly tender look at how broken people try to fix each other without actually having the tools to do it. It’s about a waitress named Carol (Helen Hunt) who is drowning in medical bills and a gay artist named Simon (Greg Kinnear) who loses everything after a violent assault. If that sounds heavy for a romantic comedy, that’s because it is. But that’s exactly why it works.
The Nicholson Factor: Why Melvin Udall Is an Impossible Character
Most actors would have made Melvin Udall a cartoon. Jack Nicholson, however, found the vibrating nerve underneath the insults.
Melvin is a successful romance novelist—a delicious irony given that he’s a misanthrope who can't stand to be touched. He lives a life of rigid, painful routine. He eats at the same table in the same diner every single day, bringing his own plastic utensils because he doesn't trust the dishwasher. When Carol, the only waitress who can handle his verbal abuse, is forced to stay home with her sick son, Melvin’s entire world collapses. Not because he cares about her—initially, anyway—but because his routine is his armor.
What’s fascinating is how the As Good as It Gets movie handles Melvin’s "redemption." It isn't a sudden flip of a switch. He doesn't wake up one day and decide to be a "good person." He simply realizes that if he wants his life to stay comfortable, he has to perform acts of kindness. He pays for Carol’s son to see a world-class doctor. He does it for selfish reasons at first—he just wants her back at work—but the byproduct is a genuine connection that he is terrified to acknowledge.
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Nicholson won the Academy Award for Best Actor for this role, and it’s easy to see why. He manages to make "Go sell crazy somewhere else, we're all stocked up here" sound both hilarious and devastatingly lonely. It’s a masterclass in nuance. He’s a guy who writes beautiful things about love but has no idea how to experience it.
Carol and Simon: More Than Just Sidekicks
Helen Hunt’s performance as Carol Connelly is arguably the backbone of the film. She won the Best Actress Oscar alongside Nicholson, marking a rare "double win" for a lead pair.
Carol isn't a manic pixie dream girl. She’s exhausted. She lives in a cramped apartment in Queens with her mother and a son who has severe chronic asthma. Her life is a cycle of nebulizers, hospital visits, and 12-hour shifts. When Melvin enters her life with his unsolicited financial help, her reaction isn't just gratitude. It’s suspicion. It’s anger. She knows there’s no such thing as a free lunch, especially not from a man who once told her to "bring me some water, and don't touch the rim."
Then there's Greg Kinnear as Simon Bishop.
Simon is the emotional center of the As Good as It Gets movie. After being nearly beaten to death by a group of robbers, he loses his spark, his dog (Verdell), and his money. His journey back from the brink—facilitated, ironically, by the man who hated him most—is the film’s most moving arc. The road trip to Baltimore that makes up the final act of the movie is where the three characters finally collide in a way that feels earned.
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The chemistry between this trio is bizarre. It shouldn't work. A bigoted novelist, a cynical waitress, and a broken artist in a Saab 900. Yet, by the time they reach the hotel, you realize they are the only family any of them has left.
Addressing the Reality of Mental Health in 1990s Cinema
If this movie were made today, the depiction of OCD would probably be handled with more medical jargon and perhaps a bit more "sensitivity." But there’s something raw about how Brooks handles it here.
Melvin isn't "cured." He just learns to manage.
The famous line—"You make me want to be a better man"—isn't just a romantic platitude. For someone with Melvin’s condition, "being a better man" means taking his medication. It means fighting the compulsions that keep him isolated. The film treats mental illness as a factor in his personality, not the entirety of it. It’s a subtle distinction that many modern films get wrong.
However, some critics in the decades since have pointed out that Melvin’s behavior toward Simon and Carol would, in a real-world scenario, be totally disqualifying. The film asks us to forgive a lot. It asks us to believe that deep down, Melvin’s insults are just a defense mechanism. Is that realistic? Maybe not always. But within the heightened reality of a James L. Brooks film, it feels true to the characters.
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Surprising Facts About the Production
- The Dog: Verdell was actually played by six different Brussels Griffons, but the primary dog was named Timer. Jack Nicholson actually grew very fond of the dogs, often carrying treats in his pockets to keep them close.
- The Script: The screenplay, co-written by Mark Andrus and James L. Brooks, went through massive revisions. At one point, the tone was significantly darker, focusing more on Simon's recovery.
- The Casting: Can you imagine anyone else as Melvin? Hans Zimmer, who composed the score, once said the music had to "twitch" just like Melvin does. It’s hard to imagine another actor bringing that same rhythmic, nervous energy.
Why the Ending Still Hits Different
The final scene of the As Good as It Gets movie is famously low-key.
There’s no grand wedding. No airport chase. No swelling orchestra. It’s just Melvin and Carol walking to a bakery at 4:00 AM. Melvin accidentally steps on a crack in the pavement and... nothing happens. He doesn't die. The world doesn't end. He realizes he's okay.
That small, quiet victory is more powerful than any cinematic explosion. It’s a reminder that for people like Melvin, progress is measured in inches, not miles.
The movie manages to be "as good as it gets" precisely because it admits that life is usually pretty messy. It doesn't promise a "happily ever after" where all of Melvin’s quirks vanish. It just promises a "happily for now" where he has someone to walk to the bakery with.
Actionable Takeaways for Movie Lovers
If you're planning a rewatch or seeing it for the first time, keep these things in mind to get the most out of the experience:
- Watch the Background: Pay attention to how the people on the street react to Melvin. The film does a great job of showing how his behavior affects the "normal" world around him.
- Listen to the Score: Hans Zimmer’s work here is vastly different from his usual bombastic stuff (like Inception or The Dark Knight). It’s playful, neurotic, and incredibly melodic.
- Analyze the Dialogue: This is a writer’s movie. Almost every line of dialogue is designed to reveal character rather than just move the plot. Notice how Melvin uses big words to create distance between himself and others.
- Check Out the Director’s Other Work: If you like this, you have to watch Terms of Endearment or Broadcast News. James L. Brooks is the king of the "dramedy" for a reason.
The As Good as It Gets movie remains a staple of American cinema because it dares to be prickly. It dares to have a protagonist who is genuinely difficult to like, and then it challenges you to love him anyway. In an era of sanitized, focus-grouped protagonists, Melvin Udall is a breath of fresh, albeit slightly neurotic, air.