(Note: Over 500 of my movie reviews are now available in my book "Cut to the Chaise Lounge or I Can't Believe I Swallowed the Remote!" Get it at Amazon.)
Funny, garish version of the Hunter S. Thompson novel directed by Terry Gilliam with the usual Gilliam brush strokes: cluttered sets, Monty Python remembrances, funky camera angles, relentless energy and a satirical eye. His "shoot me if you find a plot," and "torture me first if you find a subplot" style is regressed to after the agreeable hiatus of "12 Monkeys." Of course such a chaotic style goes well with gonzo journalism on a bad acid trip-a VERY bad acid trip.
Johnny Depp plays Hunter S. Thompson as Doonesbury's Duke with the FDR cigarette holder and pastel shades. Benicio Del Toro is offensively loutish as Dr. Gonzo, a fake Samoan from East L.A. or thereabouts. Most of this is pretty "bad," but Depp got the cartoon character down pat. The psychedelic and day-glow sets, populated with lizards and ugly Americans, splashed with glaring reds and pinks, etc., captured well not only the "fear and loathing" but the seventies Las Vegas milieu as well. The voice overs from the novel seemed a bit miraculous in the movie since at no time is Duke ever coherent or sober enough to write. Piping Debbie Reynolds's "Tammy's in Love" into the Duke/Gonzo hotel room amid the brain cell mayhem was an inspired cultural juxtaposition. Ditto for the Barbra Streisand portraits.
Best scene: Gonzo and Duke watching a clip from "Reefer Madness" at the narc's convention. Second best scene: Duke being admired by the highway patrolman who wants a kiss. Most fun: trash driving those two big Caddy convertibles.
One of the amazing things about Gilliam is how he can make fun of people without their seeming to notice. Hunter S. Thompson looks like an idiot here, and Gilliam is really satirizing the sixties/early seventies drug culture just as surely as he trashes the cops. His rapier is razor sharp, so sharp you don't feel it until you look down and see the blood on your hand.
Funny, garish version of the Hunter S. Thompson novel directed by Terry Gilliam with the usual Gilliam brush strokes: cluttered sets, Monty Python remembrances, funky camera angles, relentless energy and a satirical eye. His "shoot me if you find a plot," and "torture me first if you find a subplot" style is regressed to after the agreeable hiatus of "12 Monkeys." Of course such a chaotic style goes well with gonzo journalism on a bad acid trip-a VERY bad acid trip.
Johnny Depp plays Hunter S. Thompson as Doonesbury's Duke with the FDR cigarette holder and pastel shades. Benicio Del Toro is offensively loutish as Dr. Gonzo, a fake Samoan from East L.A. or thereabouts. Most of this is pretty "bad," but Depp got the cartoon character down pat. The psychedelic and day-glow sets, populated with lizards and ugly Americans, splashed with glaring reds and pinks, etc., captured well not only the "fear and loathing" but the seventies Las Vegas milieu as well. The voice overs from the novel seemed a bit miraculous in the movie since at no time is Duke ever coherent or sober enough to write. Piping Debbie Reynolds's "Tammy's in Love" into the Duke/Gonzo hotel room amid the brain cell mayhem was an inspired cultural juxtaposition. Ditto for the Barbra Streisand portraits.
Best scene: Gonzo and Duke watching a clip from "Reefer Madness" at the narc's convention. Second best scene: Duke being admired by the highway patrolman who wants a kiss. Most fun: trash driving those two big Caddy convertibles.
One of the amazing things about Gilliam is how he can make fun of people without their seeming to notice. Hunter S. Thompson looks like an idiot here, and Gilliam is really satirizing the sixties/early seventies drug culture just as surely as he trashes the cops. His rapier is razor sharp, so sharp you don't feel it until you look down and see the blood on your hand.