Secret Honor

In the Saddle River study, Nixon paces back and forth in the early 1980s. He is armed with a loaded revolver, a bottle of Scotch, and a running tape recorder, while closed-circuit cameras watch around him. This marks the opening frame of a ninety-minute, emotionally charged monologue about his life and career.

As he speaks, Nixon revisits his controversial life and career with a mix of rage, suspicion, sadness, and disappointment. The monologue frequently drifts into tangents, and he admonishes the unseen 'Roberto' to edit out digressions and return to calmer points. The at-times disjointed cadence reveals a man consumed by his own narrative.

Nixon's self-portrait shifts throughout the talk: sometimes he presents himself as a man of the people who rose from humble beginnings, other times he indulges in self-pity and self-justifying rhetoric. He dwells on his setbacks and hard work, yet avoids dwelling on personal faults, preferring to blame others. The tension shapes the cadence of his tirades.

He explicitly denies the relevance of Watergate, insisting he never committed a crime and was never charged. He argues that a pardon would not have mattered because he believes he was never guilty. The sense of injustice bleeds into the claim that the pardon has tainted his legacy.

Nixon admits he has been the willing tool of a political network he calls the Bohemian Grove and The Committee of 100. He suggests their interest lies in heroin trade with Asia, driven by power and a desire to bring democracy to Asia. The confession reveals a web of influence beyond official history.

He recounts that after the 1972 vote, the network ordered him to prolong the Vietnam War at all costs and to pursue a third term so they could keep profiting from him. The tension between public duty and private ambition surfaces in his narration. The narrative suggests a calculated manipulation of public fate.

Deciding he never wanted to be the president who sacrificed thousands of soldiers for drug money, Nixon contends he staged Watergate to leave office while preserving public support. The motive is framed as a self-preserving act rather than confession. He blames forces outside himself to explain his downfall.

As the scheme unfolds, he shifts blame onto the public for supporting him despite recognizing himself as a scam artist and thief in their eyes. He portrays the electorate as complicit in their own seduction by power. The narrative paints a portrait of calculated misreading of his own image.

Nixon lifts the revolver's hammer to his head and holds it there for a breathless moment, then lowers it back to the desk. The act crystallizes his volatile mood and readiness to end the confession midstream. The scene intensifies the monologue's gravity and stakes.

In the closing minutes, he declares that those who want him dead will have to do it themselves, punctuating with 'Fuck 'em!' The defiant line is reinforced by a looping display on the monitors, signaling an unresolved struggle with fate. The chant of 'Four more years!' swells in the background as the footage spirals into static.

The final two words replay on all closed-circuit monitors in staggered intervals, leaving an image of Nixon's stubborn resolve. The room fills with the growing chant of 'Four more years!' that drowns out the confession. The sequence ends as the footage collapses into static and silence.

Across the entire sequence, surveillance footage frames Nixon's confession, shaping how his life is remembered. The film probes themes of power, guilt, and control over narrative, underscored by the pervasive gaze of cameras. The closing impression is of a man both actor and prisoner of his own legend.