They say “sex sells” in Hollywood, right? But what about drugs? After all, once the production code was lifted, successful counterculture drug movies like Easy Rider gave way to the indie auteur movement in American cinema in the 1960s and 70s, where Hollywood renegades like Brian De Palma and Martin Scorsese picked up the mantle and went on to make all-time classics like Scarface and Goodfellas decades later. In the interim, there has been no shortage of critical and commercial drug movie successes, be they Blow, Sicario, Traffic, The Wolf of Wall Street, you name it.
So then, Wtf Happened to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas? Seriously. How does such an authentic movie from the altered mindstate of Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson, one directed by the venerated filmmaker Terry Gilliam and featuring unforgettable performances by Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro… how does a movie like that stumble...
So then, Wtf Happened to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas? Seriously. How does such an authentic movie from the altered mindstate of Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson, one directed by the venerated filmmaker Terry Gilliam and featuring unforgettable performances by Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro… how does a movie like that stumble...
- 4/27/2023
- by Jake Dee
- JoBlo.com
Chicago – I have a love-hate relationship with Terry Gilliam’s “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” but it’s a lot easier to fall on the former side of that dynamic with the simply amazing Criterion Collection release of the Johnny Depp & Benicio Del Toro drug epic, recently released on Blu-ray. With a stunning transfer enhanced by some of the best special features of the year to date, this is the kind of Blu-ray release that makes the actual movie better.
Blu-Ray Rating: 4.5/5.0
Being a gigantic fan of Gilliam’s early work like “Brazil” and “The Fisher King” along with someone who thought Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro were two of the coolest actors alive (keep in mind, this is way before Jack Sparrow, when Depp was not yet a household name), I had gigantic expectations for “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.” It was going to rule. It doesn’t rule.
Blu-Ray Rating: 4.5/5.0
Being a gigantic fan of Gilliam’s early work like “Brazil” and “The Fisher King” along with someone who thought Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro were two of the coolest actors alive (keep in mind, this is way before Jack Sparrow, when Depp was not yet a household name), I had gigantic expectations for “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.” It was going to rule. It doesn’t rule.
- 4/28/2011
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
An awesome bit of news for those fans of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, the Criterion release of the film is coming to Bluray on April 26th! The Terry Gilliam film stars Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro, based off of Hunter S. Thompsons novel of the same name.
It is 1971, and journalist Raoul Duke barrels toward Las Vegas—accompanied by a trunkful of contraband and his unhinged Samoan attorney, Dr. Gonzo—to cover a motorcycle race. His cut-and-dried assignment quickly descends into a feverish psychedelic odyssey. Director Terry Gilliam (Time Bandits, Brazil) and an all-star cast headlined by Johnny Depp (Edward Scissorhands, Donnie Brasco) and Benicio Del Toro (The Usual Suspects, Che) show no mercy in adapting Hunter S. Thompson’s legendary dissection of the American way of life to the screen, creating a film both hilarious and savage.
Here is a run down of the special features:
Digital transfer,...
It is 1971, and journalist Raoul Duke barrels toward Las Vegas—accompanied by a trunkful of contraband and his unhinged Samoan attorney, Dr. Gonzo—to cover a motorcycle race. His cut-and-dried assignment quickly descends into a feverish psychedelic odyssey. Director Terry Gilliam (Time Bandits, Brazil) and an all-star cast headlined by Johnny Depp (Edward Scissorhands, Donnie Brasco) and Benicio Del Toro (The Usual Suspects, Che) show no mercy in adapting Hunter S. Thompson’s legendary dissection of the American way of life to the screen, creating a film both hilarious and savage.
Here is a run down of the special features:
Digital transfer,...
- 2/22/2011
- by Marcella Papandrea
- Killer Films
Screened
CineVegas Film Festival, Las Vegas
Eighteen years in the making, Wayne Ewing's "Breakfast With Hunter" is an intimate verite portrait that honors its subject with fierce affection and respect.
Eschewing a talking-heads bio approach, the film assumes knowledge of Hunter S. Thompson's work but nevertheless serves as an incisive intro for the uninitiated. Among a cavalcade of luminaries, Johnny Depp, Benicio Del Toro and John Cusack make notable, decidedly non-glam appearances, clearly thrilled to be hanging out with the inventor and eminence grise of gonzo journalism.
As a friend, neighbor and colleague of Thompson, Ewing, whose television helming and DP credits include "Bill Moyers' Journal", "Frontline" and "Homicide", was afforded remarkable access.
The film- and DV-shot documentary had its world premiere June 21 as the closing-night selection of the CineVegas festival (with Thompson in attendance). It deserves further fest exposure and is a natural for docu-themed cable slots. The right distributor could parlay the writer's iconoclastic appeal into limited theatrical play for art house and college crowds.
Ewing centers on 1996-97, when Thompson was busy on three fronts: battling what he considered a political arrest in Aspen, Colo., on bogus DUI charges; making appearances at 25th anniversary celebrations of his 1971 book "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"; and, in the film's most compelling sequence, confronting creative obstacles to big-screen plans for that book, in the form of a profoundly misguided director and screenwriter.
During the round of 25th-anniversary tributes, those offering praise cover the political spectrum from P.J. O'Rourke to George McGovern, and Thompson's son, Juan, delivers a moving appreciation of his integrity and his place in American letters.
Reading Thompson's work to audiences, an amused Cusack, the gum-chewing, deadpan Depp and an exultant Roxanne Pulitzer present ample evidence of the author's moral clarity and the caustic humor and diamond-sharp prose with which he's raged against hypocrisy for more than three decades.
Here the soundtrack to those decades is replete with songs by Warren Zevon and the clink of ice in a tall glass of Chivas. The film's title refers to the prodigious all-nighters the director and other valiant stony warriors shared with Thompson, especially at Owl Farm, his "heavily fortified," peacock-friendly ranch near Aspen. There's a revealing glimpse of the friendship between Thompson and longtime collaborator Ralph Steadman when the artist visits the compound with an offering of rare Scotches and a startling revisionist assessment of his role in the author's work.
But the incident Ewing rightly puts center stage is the astounding meeting between Thompson and the team initially assigned to the film adaptation of "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" -- scripter Tod Davies and helmer Alex Cox, whose outlaw sympathies ("Sid and Nancy", "Straight to Hell") might have made him seem the right choice for the project. (They both received screenwriting credit, along with others, on the Terry Gilliam-directed 1998 film.) The would-be collaboration implodes when the duo earnestly present a ham-fisted visual concept for a key section of the book, a passage that Thompson accurately calls "one of the best things I've ever written."
Second only to Cox and Davies' mind-boggling literalness is the obduracy with which they cling to their dumb idea in the face of Thompson's reasonable objections and rising anger. Their self-destruction is fascinating to behold; later, watching tape of the incident in Thompson's Chateau Marmont suite, Del Toro can only marvel at their unwillingness to bend, or at least shut up.
The scene that unfolds recalls another memorable cinema verite moment: Donovan's humiliation at Dylan's hands in "Don't Look Back". But this exchange draws its power not from any casually sadistic streak on Thompson's part but from his clearheaded defense of his work against clueless marauders. "Breakfast With Hunter" is a convincing exploration of why that work matters.
BREAKFAST WITH HUNTER
Wayne Ewing Films Inc and Gonzo International
Credits:
Director/writer/producer/director of photograpy/editor: Wayne Ewing
Executive producer: Andrew Ewing With: Hunter S. Thompson, Johnny Depp, Benicio Del Toro, John Cusack, Ralph Steadman, Juan Thompson, Jann Wenner, George Plimpton, Alex Cox, Tod Davies, Laila Nabulsi, Warren Zevon, Roxanne Pulitzer, George McGovern, Frank Mankiewicz, Douglas Brinkley, PJ O'Rourke, Lyle Lovett, Matt Dillon
Running time -- 92 minutes
No MPAA rating...
CineVegas Film Festival, Las Vegas
Eighteen years in the making, Wayne Ewing's "Breakfast With Hunter" is an intimate verite portrait that honors its subject with fierce affection and respect.
Eschewing a talking-heads bio approach, the film assumes knowledge of Hunter S. Thompson's work but nevertheless serves as an incisive intro for the uninitiated. Among a cavalcade of luminaries, Johnny Depp, Benicio Del Toro and John Cusack make notable, decidedly non-glam appearances, clearly thrilled to be hanging out with the inventor and eminence grise of gonzo journalism.
As a friend, neighbor and colleague of Thompson, Ewing, whose television helming and DP credits include "Bill Moyers' Journal", "Frontline" and "Homicide", was afforded remarkable access.
The film- and DV-shot documentary had its world premiere June 21 as the closing-night selection of the CineVegas festival (with Thompson in attendance). It deserves further fest exposure and is a natural for docu-themed cable slots. The right distributor could parlay the writer's iconoclastic appeal into limited theatrical play for art house and college crowds.
Ewing centers on 1996-97, when Thompson was busy on three fronts: battling what he considered a political arrest in Aspen, Colo., on bogus DUI charges; making appearances at 25th anniversary celebrations of his 1971 book "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"; and, in the film's most compelling sequence, confronting creative obstacles to big-screen plans for that book, in the form of a profoundly misguided director and screenwriter.
During the round of 25th-anniversary tributes, those offering praise cover the political spectrum from P.J. O'Rourke to George McGovern, and Thompson's son, Juan, delivers a moving appreciation of his integrity and his place in American letters.
Reading Thompson's work to audiences, an amused Cusack, the gum-chewing, deadpan Depp and an exultant Roxanne Pulitzer present ample evidence of the author's moral clarity and the caustic humor and diamond-sharp prose with which he's raged against hypocrisy for more than three decades.
Here the soundtrack to those decades is replete with songs by Warren Zevon and the clink of ice in a tall glass of Chivas. The film's title refers to the prodigious all-nighters the director and other valiant stony warriors shared with Thompson, especially at Owl Farm, his "heavily fortified," peacock-friendly ranch near Aspen. There's a revealing glimpse of the friendship between Thompson and longtime collaborator Ralph Steadman when the artist visits the compound with an offering of rare Scotches and a startling revisionist assessment of his role in the author's work.
But the incident Ewing rightly puts center stage is the astounding meeting between Thompson and the team initially assigned to the film adaptation of "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" -- scripter Tod Davies and helmer Alex Cox, whose outlaw sympathies ("Sid and Nancy", "Straight to Hell") might have made him seem the right choice for the project. (They both received screenwriting credit, along with others, on the Terry Gilliam-directed 1998 film.) The would-be collaboration implodes when the duo earnestly present a ham-fisted visual concept for a key section of the book, a passage that Thompson accurately calls "one of the best things I've ever written."
Second only to Cox and Davies' mind-boggling literalness is the obduracy with which they cling to their dumb idea in the face of Thompson's reasonable objections and rising anger. Their self-destruction is fascinating to behold; later, watching tape of the incident in Thompson's Chateau Marmont suite, Del Toro can only marvel at their unwillingness to bend, or at least shut up.
The scene that unfolds recalls another memorable cinema verite moment: Donovan's humiliation at Dylan's hands in "Don't Look Back". But this exchange draws its power not from any casually sadistic streak on Thompson's part but from his clearheaded defense of his work against clueless marauders. "Breakfast With Hunter" is a convincing exploration of why that work matters.
BREAKFAST WITH HUNTER
Wayne Ewing Films Inc and Gonzo International
Credits:
Director/writer/producer/director of photograpy/editor: Wayne Ewing
Executive producer: Andrew Ewing With: Hunter S. Thompson, Johnny Depp, Benicio Del Toro, John Cusack, Ralph Steadman, Juan Thompson, Jann Wenner, George Plimpton, Alex Cox, Tod Davies, Laila Nabulsi, Warren Zevon, Roxanne Pulitzer, George McGovern, Frank Mankiewicz, Douglas Brinkley, PJ O'Rourke, Lyle Lovett, Matt Dillon
Running time -- 92 minutes
No MPAA rating...
Screened
CineVegas Film Festival, Las Vegas
Eighteen years in the making, Wayne Ewing's "Breakfast With Hunter" is an intimate verite portrait that honors its subject with fierce affection and respect.
Eschewing a talking-heads bio approach, the film assumes knowledge of Hunter S. Thompson's work but nevertheless serves as an incisive intro for the uninitiated. Among a cavalcade of luminaries, Johnny Depp, Benicio Del Toro and John Cusack make notable, decidedly non-glam appearances, clearly thrilled to be hanging out with the inventor and eminence grise of gonzo journalism.
As a friend, neighbor and colleague of Thompson, Ewing, whose television helming and DP credits include "Bill Moyers' Journal", "Frontline" and "Homicide", was afforded remarkable access.
The film- and DV-shot documentary had its world premiere June 21 as the closing-night selection of the CineVegas festival (with Thompson in attendance). It deserves further fest exposure and is a natural for docu-themed cable slots. The right distributor could parlay the writer's iconoclastic appeal into limited theatrical play for art house and college crowds.
Ewing centers on 1996-97, when Thompson was busy on three fronts: battling what he considered a political arrest in Aspen, Colo., on bogus DUI charges; making appearances at 25th anniversary celebrations of his 1971 book "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"; and, in the film's most compelling sequence, confronting creative obstacles to big-screen plans for that book, in the form of a profoundly misguided director and screenwriter.
During the round of 25th-anniversary tributes, those offering praise cover the political spectrum from P.J. O'Rourke to George McGovern, and Thompson's son, Juan, delivers a moving appreciation of his integrity and his place in American letters.
Reading Thompson's work to audiences, an amused Cusack, the gum-chewing, deadpan Depp and an exultant Roxanne Pulitzer present ample evidence of the author's moral clarity and the caustic humor and diamond-sharp prose with which he's raged against hypocrisy for more than three decades.
Here the soundtrack to those decades is replete with songs by Warren Zevon and the clink of ice in a tall glass of Chivas. The film's title refers to the prodigious all-nighters the director and other valiant stony warriors shared with Thompson, especially at Owl Farm, his "heavily fortified," peacock-friendly ranch near Aspen. There's a revealing glimpse of the friendship between Thompson and longtime collaborator Ralph Steadman when the artist visits the compound with an offering of rare Scotches and a startling revisionist assessment of his role in the author's work.
But the incident Ewing rightly puts center stage is the astounding meeting between Thompson and the team initially assigned to the film adaptation of "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" -- scripter Tod Davies and helmer Alex Cox, whose outlaw sympathies ("Sid and Nancy", "Straight to Hell") might have made him seem the right choice for the project. (They both received screenwriting credit, along with others, on the Terry Gilliam-directed 1998 film.) The would-be collaboration implodes when the duo earnestly present a ham-fisted visual concept for a key section of the book, a passage that Thompson accurately calls "one of the best things I've ever written."
Second only to Cox and Davies' mind-boggling literalness is the obduracy with which they cling to their dumb idea in the face of Thompson's reasonable objections and rising anger. Their self-destruction is fascinating to behold; later, watching tape of the incident in Thompson's Chateau Marmont suite, Del Toro can only marvel at their unwillingness to bend, or at least shut up.
The scene that unfolds recalls another memorable cinema verite moment: Donovan's humiliation at Dylan's hands in "Don't Look Back". But this exchange draws its power not from any casually sadistic streak on Thompson's part but from his clearheaded defense of his work against clueless marauders. "Breakfast With Hunter" is a convincing exploration of why that work matters.
BREAKFAST WITH HUNTER
Wayne Ewing Films Inc and Gonzo International
Credits:
Director/writer/producer/director of photograpy/editor: Wayne Ewing
Executive producer: Andrew Ewing With: Hunter S. Thompson, Johnny Depp, Benicio Del Toro, John Cusack, Ralph Steadman, Juan Thompson, Jann Wenner, George Plimpton, Alex Cox, Tod Davies, Laila Nabulsi, Warren Zevon, Roxanne Pulitzer, George McGovern, Frank Mankiewicz, Douglas Brinkley, PJ O'Rourke, Lyle Lovett, Matt Dillon
Running time -- 92 minutes
No MPAA rating...
CineVegas Film Festival, Las Vegas
Eighteen years in the making, Wayne Ewing's "Breakfast With Hunter" is an intimate verite portrait that honors its subject with fierce affection and respect.
Eschewing a talking-heads bio approach, the film assumes knowledge of Hunter S. Thompson's work but nevertheless serves as an incisive intro for the uninitiated. Among a cavalcade of luminaries, Johnny Depp, Benicio Del Toro and John Cusack make notable, decidedly non-glam appearances, clearly thrilled to be hanging out with the inventor and eminence grise of gonzo journalism.
As a friend, neighbor and colleague of Thompson, Ewing, whose television helming and DP credits include "Bill Moyers' Journal", "Frontline" and "Homicide", was afforded remarkable access.
The film- and DV-shot documentary had its world premiere June 21 as the closing-night selection of the CineVegas festival (with Thompson in attendance). It deserves further fest exposure and is a natural for docu-themed cable slots. The right distributor could parlay the writer's iconoclastic appeal into limited theatrical play for art house and college crowds.
Ewing centers on 1996-97, when Thompson was busy on three fronts: battling what he considered a political arrest in Aspen, Colo., on bogus DUI charges; making appearances at 25th anniversary celebrations of his 1971 book "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"; and, in the film's most compelling sequence, confronting creative obstacles to big-screen plans for that book, in the form of a profoundly misguided director and screenwriter.
During the round of 25th-anniversary tributes, those offering praise cover the political spectrum from P.J. O'Rourke to George McGovern, and Thompson's son, Juan, delivers a moving appreciation of his integrity and his place in American letters.
Reading Thompson's work to audiences, an amused Cusack, the gum-chewing, deadpan Depp and an exultant Roxanne Pulitzer present ample evidence of the author's moral clarity and the caustic humor and diamond-sharp prose with which he's raged against hypocrisy for more than three decades.
Here the soundtrack to those decades is replete with songs by Warren Zevon and the clink of ice in a tall glass of Chivas. The film's title refers to the prodigious all-nighters the director and other valiant stony warriors shared with Thompson, especially at Owl Farm, his "heavily fortified," peacock-friendly ranch near Aspen. There's a revealing glimpse of the friendship between Thompson and longtime collaborator Ralph Steadman when the artist visits the compound with an offering of rare Scotches and a startling revisionist assessment of his role in the author's work.
But the incident Ewing rightly puts center stage is the astounding meeting between Thompson and the team initially assigned to the film adaptation of "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" -- scripter Tod Davies and helmer Alex Cox, whose outlaw sympathies ("Sid and Nancy", "Straight to Hell") might have made him seem the right choice for the project. (They both received screenwriting credit, along with others, on the Terry Gilliam-directed 1998 film.) The would-be collaboration implodes when the duo earnestly present a ham-fisted visual concept for a key section of the book, a passage that Thompson accurately calls "one of the best things I've ever written."
Second only to Cox and Davies' mind-boggling literalness is the obduracy with which they cling to their dumb idea in the face of Thompson's reasonable objections and rising anger. Their self-destruction is fascinating to behold; later, watching tape of the incident in Thompson's Chateau Marmont suite, Del Toro can only marvel at their unwillingness to bend, or at least shut up.
The scene that unfolds recalls another memorable cinema verite moment: Donovan's humiliation at Dylan's hands in "Don't Look Back". But this exchange draws its power not from any casually sadistic streak on Thompson's part but from his clearheaded defense of his work against clueless marauders. "Breakfast With Hunter" is a convincing exploration of why that work matters.
BREAKFAST WITH HUNTER
Wayne Ewing Films Inc and Gonzo International
Credits:
Director/writer/producer/director of photograpy/editor: Wayne Ewing
Executive producer: Andrew Ewing With: Hunter S. Thompson, Johnny Depp, Benicio Del Toro, John Cusack, Ralph Steadman, Juan Thompson, Jann Wenner, George Plimpton, Alex Cox, Tod Davies, Laila Nabulsi, Warren Zevon, Roxanne Pulitzer, George McGovern, Frank Mankiewicz, Douglas Brinkley, PJ O'Rourke, Lyle Lovett, Matt Dillon
Running time -- 92 minutes
No MPAA rating...
Gonzo journalism has deteriorated into bozo cinema in Universal's "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas". A dunderheadedly inane adaptation of Hunter S. Thompson's searing Rolling Stone article published 27 years ago and expanded into a book, the flaccid film is a goon-show version of Thompson's commentary on the craziness of the American Dream.
Nostalgia-crazed baby boomers who remember being glazed and grazed by Thompson's writings way back when will be sorely jilted by this simplistic reduction of the writer's work and experiences to bald-faced buffoonery.
In the slapstick cinematic, Johnny Depp stars as Dr. Thompson, the era's most flamboyant, outrageous journalist whose combative political pronouncements and incendiary volleys against the reigning establishment stoked countercultural fires then burning in college youth. As celebrated and wasted as a lead guitarist, Thompson was known as much for his drug-gorging persona as his colorful, inflammatory writings.
For studio execs too wet-behind-the-ears to remember Thompson's heyday, "Fear and Loathing" was based on Thompson's excursion to Las Vegas, ostensibly to cover an off-road race for Sports Illustrated. As per his custom, he was accompanied by his lawyer, Oscar Zetz Acosta, an activist and fellow substance abuser along for moral and legal support.
For Thompson, Las Vegas was a vast moral, ethical pit -- a microcosm of the warping of America -- and his writings were less about the road race and more blunt broadsides against establishment culture. That his comments and insights were fired and fueled by every known form of illegal substance was part of his legend. Unfortunately, in this lazy distillation, drunkenness and dislocation are the main focus and -- even dopier -- it's played out as variety-show slapstick.
Depp's reeling performance as the addled, brilliant journalist recalls Red Skelton's Clem Kadiddlehopper, when the popular comedian used to rubber-knee his way around stage with silly grins, flailing his arms to latch onto something. In short, "Fear and Loathing" has been dummied down to a "Beer and Foaming" level -- it's merely a one-joke show as Depp and Benicio Del Toro, as the lawyer sidekick, careen from casino to casino.
On a purely comic level, the film doesn't even achieve the loopy hilarity of "Where the Buffalo Roam", in which Bill Murray essayed the antic, gonzo journalist and every now and then captured his peculiar genius. (Remember that great scene where he had the Hispanic maids running around with the couch cushions simulating the Dallas Cowboys' flex defense?)
Unfortunately, Terry Gilliam's encapsulation is merely an uninspired series of stumblebum scenes as Depp and Del Toro crash and slide through the neon nether world of Las Vegas. As befits a project with four credited screenwriters, the story shows its seams. We note some Alex Cox influences, mainly in scenes of vomit and physical breakdown a la "Sid & Nancy," which ring true but are entirely counter to the slap-happy rest of the film.
Visually, "Fear and Loathing" is a disaster. Thompson's delirium and genius, including fits of drug-induced dementia and hallucinations, is visualized in the most banal terms. Lounge lizards and all sorts of reptilian imagery appear, but they seem to have landed straight from a cereal box or theme park, so humdrum and pedestrian are the designs. If Thompson sees this movie, we hope he'll have a couple bottles of Wild Turkey on hand to wash it down.
FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS
Universal Pictures
CREDITS:
Producers: Laila Nabulsi, Patrick Cassavetti, Stephen Nemeth
Director: Terry Gilliam
Screenwriters: Terry Gilliam, Tony Grisoni, Tod Davies, Alex Cox
Based on the book by: Hunter S. Thompson
Executive producers: Harold Bronson, Richard Foos
Director of photography: Nicola Pecorini
Production designer: Alex McDowell
Editor : Lesley Walker
Costume designer: Julie Weiss
Co-producer: Elliot Lewis Rosenblatt
Casting: Margery Simkin
Lounge Lizards designed by: Rob Bottin
Sound mixer: Jay Meagher
CAST:
Raoul Duke: Johnny Depp
Dr. Gonzo: Benicio Del Toro
Hitchhiker: Tobey Maguire
Uniformed Dwarf: Michael Lee Gogin
Car Rental Agent (Los Angeles): Larry Cedar
Parking Attendant: Brian LeBaron
Reservations Clerk: Katherine Helmond
Running time: 123 minutes...
Nostalgia-crazed baby boomers who remember being glazed and grazed by Thompson's writings way back when will be sorely jilted by this simplistic reduction of the writer's work and experiences to bald-faced buffoonery.
In the slapstick cinematic, Johnny Depp stars as Dr. Thompson, the era's most flamboyant, outrageous journalist whose combative political pronouncements and incendiary volleys against the reigning establishment stoked countercultural fires then burning in college youth. As celebrated and wasted as a lead guitarist, Thompson was known as much for his drug-gorging persona as his colorful, inflammatory writings.
For studio execs too wet-behind-the-ears to remember Thompson's heyday, "Fear and Loathing" was based on Thompson's excursion to Las Vegas, ostensibly to cover an off-road race for Sports Illustrated. As per his custom, he was accompanied by his lawyer, Oscar Zetz Acosta, an activist and fellow substance abuser along for moral and legal support.
For Thompson, Las Vegas was a vast moral, ethical pit -- a microcosm of the warping of America -- and his writings were less about the road race and more blunt broadsides against establishment culture. That his comments and insights were fired and fueled by every known form of illegal substance was part of his legend. Unfortunately, in this lazy distillation, drunkenness and dislocation are the main focus and -- even dopier -- it's played out as variety-show slapstick.
Depp's reeling performance as the addled, brilliant journalist recalls Red Skelton's Clem Kadiddlehopper, when the popular comedian used to rubber-knee his way around stage with silly grins, flailing his arms to latch onto something. In short, "Fear and Loathing" has been dummied down to a "Beer and Foaming" level -- it's merely a one-joke show as Depp and Benicio Del Toro, as the lawyer sidekick, careen from casino to casino.
On a purely comic level, the film doesn't even achieve the loopy hilarity of "Where the Buffalo Roam", in which Bill Murray essayed the antic, gonzo journalist and every now and then captured his peculiar genius. (Remember that great scene where he had the Hispanic maids running around with the couch cushions simulating the Dallas Cowboys' flex defense?)
Unfortunately, Terry Gilliam's encapsulation is merely an uninspired series of stumblebum scenes as Depp and Del Toro crash and slide through the neon nether world of Las Vegas. As befits a project with four credited screenwriters, the story shows its seams. We note some Alex Cox influences, mainly in scenes of vomit and physical breakdown a la "Sid & Nancy," which ring true but are entirely counter to the slap-happy rest of the film.
Visually, "Fear and Loathing" is a disaster. Thompson's delirium and genius, including fits of drug-induced dementia and hallucinations, is visualized in the most banal terms. Lounge lizards and all sorts of reptilian imagery appear, but they seem to have landed straight from a cereal box or theme park, so humdrum and pedestrian are the designs. If Thompson sees this movie, we hope he'll have a couple bottles of Wild Turkey on hand to wash it down.
FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS
Universal Pictures
CREDITS:
Producers: Laila Nabulsi, Patrick Cassavetti, Stephen Nemeth
Director: Terry Gilliam
Screenwriters: Terry Gilliam, Tony Grisoni, Tod Davies, Alex Cox
Based on the book by: Hunter S. Thompson
Executive producers: Harold Bronson, Richard Foos
Director of photography: Nicola Pecorini
Production designer: Alex McDowell
Editor : Lesley Walker
Costume designer: Julie Weiss
Co-producer: Elliot Lewis Rosenblatt
Casting: Margery Simkin
Lounge Lizards designed by: Rob Bottin
Sound mixer: Jay Meagher
CAST:
Raoul Duke: Johnny Depp
Dr. Gonzo: Benicio Del Toro
Hitchhiker: Tobey Maguire
Uniformed Dwarf: Michael Lee Gogin
Car Rental Agent (Los Angeles): Larry Cedar
Parking Attendant: Brian LeBaron
Reservations Clerk: Katherine Helmond
Running time: 123 minutes...
- 5/18/1998
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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