Film
What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases
Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson (2008)
Director: Alex Gibney
Movie review
From Time Out New York
For a journalist, Hunter S. Thompson sure had a lot of guns: 22 of them by his ex-wife’s recollection in Alex Gibney’s seasoned, evenhanded profile. And that will always be the dominant image of him, wiry and wired, a loon behind his shades, squatting on his Aspen, Colorado, compound shooting at things. Gibney uses much of this footage, as well as an eerie montage of Thompson taking aim at a rider on a motorbike wearing a rubber Nixon mask. Turns out it’s the gonzo writer himself, and there can’t be a better, more suggestive moment: Thompson needed his nemesis both to flourish and to self-destruct.
Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson is a valuable reclamation of the political from the personal. Terry Gilliam and Johnny Depp (Gibney’s enjoyably sober narrator) turned Thompson into a borderline clown for 1998’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas; this documentary restores a fair measure of the intelligent (even feared) critic and author, here remembered by Nixon adviser Pat Buchanan, boss Jann Wenner of Rolling Stone, and Jimmy Carter and George McGovern. They all smile, recalling the sparrer and serious talent, invariably dubbed a “romantic,” let down by elections and his own hopes for change.
The film is smart enough to create an arresting swirl of late-’60s media hyperbole: Hells Angels, Vietnam bombings and Nixon’s robotic grinning. It makes sense that a writer would emerge from it all ready to play his own dirty tricks. But where is the clampdown on that culture? Thompson spent much of the ’80s and ’90s out of touch; how could Gibney not try to explain the thrown-off prophet? Still, this is valuable stuff—a reminder of tactics our press has forgotten.
Author: Joshua Rothkopf
Time Out New York Issue 666: July 2 - 9, 2008
Most popular on this site
Top Stories
The Coens' 'Burn after Reading': review
Pitt and Clooney star in the Coen brothers' latest, 'Burn After Reading', which opened the 2008 Venice film festival
John C Reilly on ‘Step Brothers’
Method man turned slapstick comic John C Reilly talks to Time Out about his new film ‘Step Brothers’
Guy Ritchie on ‘RocknRolla’
Wally Hammond talks to Guy Ritchie about his latest film, ‘RocknRolla’ which sees him safely back in his old manor among the familiar carnival of villains, scams and high-octane spills and thrills
Saul Dibb on ‘The Duchess’
Dave Calhoun discovers from director Saul Dibb that his latest, 'The Duchess’ is far from your typical aristos-in-love movie
Opinion: Can George Lucas still make ‘small’ movies?
With the release of animated spin-off 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars', Tom Huddleston wonders whether George Lucas will ever return to his roots.







What do you think?
Post your review now