What an ambitious flick. In his runaway, best-selling novel of all time, typed out on a continuous roll of toilet paper fifty-thousand miles long, Jack Kerouac in the late 1950s established himself and his character, "Dean Moriarty," as alternate-culture heroes. The drove fast all over the country, smoked joints the size of cigars (in the 1950s), listened to nothing but jazz, and wore themselves out having a good time. Some people make history, some make the scene. And some manage, somehow, to make both, as the Beatniks did.
The movie tries to capture some of this bullet-speed trip, and focuses on "Dean Moriarty," who was in real life a failed husband and father named Neal Cassady (Tate Donovan). Poor Kerouac wound up a pathetic drunk living with his domineering mother in a small Massachusetts mill town -- two bottles a day and a sweaty T shirt. But at least he left an original record behind. His novels and essays read like folds of cloth flung from the bolt. The hypomanic Cassady left little behind but his image. He segued neatly from Beatnikism to Hippiedom, driving Ken Kesey's bus full of Merry Pranksters from coast to coast, handing out LSD-laced kool aid from buckets.
It's a tough job, trying to get this down, especially on a small budget. Mostly we get to see Cassady during his period with Ken Kesey, and little of the ventures that gained him fame in the first place. The question behind the film seems to be, "How do you cope with fame?" Kind of banal. I suppose one thing you could do is settle down and take care of your family. Or you could ignore it and just do what you want, which is what the real Cassady apparently did. The movie shows him often in anguish, which doesn't seem true to his personal temperament. Cassady was stimulus-hungry, a man of action, and the last guy to torment himself with ontological questions.
Tate Donovan, as Cassady, is hard to evaluate. I get the idea he's trying to project -- Cassady as a constant talker full of hokum and hesitations -- but I also get the idea that he's trying to project that idea. I've never met Cassady but Donovan's performance strikes me as a nearly perfect Saturday Night Live imitation of Neal Cassady.
The other performers are up to the task. Chris Bauer fits the relatively quiet and innovative template of Ken Kesey established by Tom Wolfe. Glenn Fitzgerald has a good grip on Kerouac's later gloomy loneliness without overdoing it. Ye gods, I watched the real Kerouac on William F. Buckley's "Firing Line" make a fool of himself -- drunk as a skunk, giving the finger to a Hippie guest who adored him, and calling him a "commie pinko." But then none of the performances here are overdone, as they sometimes were by the historical characters themselves. Everything is kept within believable founds and the incidents we see are credible. That's fine, but it doesn't add much zip to the story, fragmented as it is. (I never thought I'd hear myself calling for more action in a contemporary movie. When "Die Hardest of All" or "Rambo: The Early Years" finally appear, it will fuse my synapses.) It's a strange movie about some strange times. It's only partially successful because it's hobbled by a small budget combined with the epic quality of its subject. How'd you like to make a movie about the creation of the universe with only finger paints and firecrackers available for special effects?
The movie tries to capture some of this bullet-speed trip, and focuses on "Dean Moriarty," who was in real life a failed husband and father named Neal Cassady (Tate Donovan). Poor Kerouac wound up a pathetic drunk living with his domineering mother in a small Massachusetts mill town -- two bottles a day and a sweaty T shirt. But at least he left an original record behind. His novels and essays read like folds of cloth flung from the bolt. The hypomanic Cassady left little behind but his image. He segued neatly from Beatnikism to Hippiedom, driving Ken Kesey's bus full of Merry Pranksters from coast to coast, handing out LSD-laced kool aid from buckets.
It's a tough job, trying to get this down, especially on a small budget. Mostly we get to see Cassady during his period with Ken Kesey, and little of the ventures that gained him fame in the first place. The question behind the film seems to be, "How do you cope with fame?" Kind of banal. I suppose one thing you could do is settle down and take care of your family. Or you could ignore it and just do what you want, which is what the real Cassady apparently did. The movie shows him often in anguish, which doesn't seem true to his personal temperament. Cassady was stimulus-hungry, a man of action, and the last guy to torment himself with ontological questions.
Tate Donovan, as Cassady, is hard to evaluate. I get the idea he's trying to project -- Cassady as a constant talker full of hokum and hesitations -- but I also get the idea that he's trying to project that idea. I've never met Cassady but Donovan's performance strikes me as a nearly perfect Saturday Night Live imitation of Neal Cassady.
The other performers are up to the task. Chris Bauer fits the relatively quiet and innovative template of Ken Kesey established by Tom Wolfe. Glenn Fitzgerald has a good grip on Kerouac's later gloomy loneliness without overdoing it. Ye gods, I watched the real Kerouac on William F. Buckley's "Firing Line" make a fool of himself -- drunk as a skunk, giving the finger to a Hippie guest who adored him, and calling him a "commie pinko." But then none of the performances here are overdone, as they sometimes were by the historical characters themselves. Everything is kept within believable founds and the incidents we see are credible. That's fine, but it doesn't add much zip to the story, fragmented as it is. (I never thought I'd hear myself calling for more action in a contemporary movie. When "Die Hardest of All" or "Rambo: The Early Years" finally appear, it will fuse my synapses.) It's a strange movie about some strange times. It's only partially successful because it's hobbled by a small budget combined with the epic quality of its subject. How'd you like to make a movie about the creation of the universe with only finger paints and firecrackers available for special effects?