Movie 3: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) by Terry Gilliam
starring Johnny Depp and Benecio del Toro

In a nutshell: Uneven and too long

Content: I remembered watching the first half of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and liking it when I was in college, but I couldn't remember whether or not I had ever finished it. Turns out I never did, and I definitely would have had better memories of the movie if I hadn't bothered to find out. But I did bother to watch the entire thing, finally, and it left me with pretty mixed emotions.

In case you haven't seen it, the film is based on a book (which I have not read) by the late Hunter S. Thompson about a drug addled weekend in Vegas on assignment as a reporter. The Hunter S. character is played expertly by Depp, and he is accompanied by his completely insane lawyer, played by del Toro with his usual brilliance.

The movie absolutely has its moments. The opening scene is one of the more memorable opening scenes of the '90's, with a barely recognizable Tobey Maguire appearing as a hitchiker. I was riveted by several other scenes as well. Generally, I found that when at least one of the characters was sober, the movie held my attention. But, when both of the characters are simultaneously high as a kite, the movie was just spinning its wheels, waiting for one of the characters to sober up in order to move the plot along. In these scenes, the movie turns into madness, which I am sure was Gilliam's intention, however, it was too much for me most of the time. I preferred the way they handled such scenes in another drug epic, Trainspotting.

Anyhow, this is probably as close as you will see to a mainstream impressionist movie these days, with the scenery reflecting the character's state of mind. And I am not just talking about the hallucinations of giant lizards and moving carpets. Rather the flashing lights, and tilted camera angles that show up when the charaters are in drug induced hazes, but not while sober.

There is not too much in terms of plot. There are various threads of stories that weave in and out of the narrative, but none of them really serve a purpose. The constant narration by Depp, which I would guess comes directly out of the book, was interesting at times, but grew very tiresome. At times we just listen to Depp wax philosophic while watching 2 people bumble around and break things, incapacitated by drugs. It seemed like about half the film was spent this way, which I did not find terribly entertaining. Especially when the movie clocks in at over two hours.

One great scene was the diner scene towards the end. By this point I had no idea what del Toro's character was capable of or what his state of mind was, and it had me on the edge of my seat. The tension Gilliam had managed to build was very effective.

In summary, the acting is often spectacular, there are plenty of cameos to go around (Cameron Diaz, Maguire, Gary Busey, Christina Ricci, etc.), and Gilliam's impressionism is at times very interesting, but I found the movie too long and pointless. It stalled for 20 minutes at a time, and as I neared the two hour mark, I just wanted it to end.

Rolling Rankings:
1. Sideways (#1)

2. Raising Arizona (#2)

3. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (#3)