Terry Gilliam’s central character speaks in a weird manner wherein you can easily guess it is his movie. It seems the character of Brad Pitt in “12 Monkeys” jumped out of it and traveled through into the character of Duke (Johnny Depp). The difference though is the former is on a motto of freeing the animals in zoo and the later drenches in the unnamed drugs invented in this planet. This is an ambitious movie based upon the novel “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream” by Hunter S. Thompson.“We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a saltshaker half-full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, laughers, screamers... Also, a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether, and two dozen amyls.” Says Duke. Some of those I do not even know what exactly they are talking about. All I can say is that they are the most potent drugs you can have the hands on. And some one having it is not in a state of saying those because they do not have the clue of what they see is what it is. This illusion and influence of the drugs makes Duke and Dr. Gonzo (Benicio Del Toro) break every single law existent in 1971 and till date. In fact they break and insult the existence of order even if there is an anarchical society. They are venturing into Las Vegas to cover a bike racing event which seems have no concentration or relation of any kind.
As I have not read the book, may be the delusional and hallucinogenic explanation in words coming to picture did not excite me. In a mode of film making and a style of those nonsensical ramblings with inner meaning seem to appeal on very countable occasions. Those points of course have the strength and the power of truth. But I had to doubt myself on it since the real touch of it is either due to its quality content of it or the effect of being occupied so uneasily by the chain of events which go through on the screen. The era of Vietnam War and other symbolic apprehension towards it are shown in back ground in TVs and some methodical representation as an encounter to Duke. The book and film consider implicating the fact of bold and daring statements. The statements are hidden in the midst of obnoxious behaviour of these two people. It is not subtle but are symbolic and some straight on points too. I did not notice those. I came to know that the movie had those after I read about it in internet. Now thinking about it, there seems no recollection of those. The reason is mainly due to the focus on the delusional encounters of Duke and Dr. Gonzo. While it is seen as a technique to pick out those original thoughts of the author, it gets consumed by its own addiction of portraying the drug effect.
I am taking a wild guess that the Duke in the book does not talk the way Johnny Depp does in the movie. The style is typical Terry Gilliam’s characteristics of his protagonist in his movies. Gilliam takes his level further more in testing how much the audience can tolerate this unusual film making of unusual characters. Comparing “Brazil”, “12 Monkeys” and this movie, the way all the characters behave in these three movies are noticeably same. If it is the manner of Gilliam’s film making, it is neither interesting nor intuitive. But there is the touch of class in couple of scenes which keeps me wondering on where these shots takes it breaks in rest of the story.
Depp and Del Toro are the duo matching each other well in the sense of who is in touch with sanity and migrate to the madness in how much time. The balance is kept with a subconscious effort from both the characters when one remains sane (I mean not plunging into drugs as the other party does) and lets the other one immerse him into nightmares and insanity. Their tight screen presence and tension makes them one of the most hated and dreadful characters.
What come out of this movie are the nightmare incidence and a city on which madness as its core is met by the exponential factor of it to destroy and explode. This movie took me back to “Trainspotting”, another disgusting but intense story on drug addiction and its effects. That movie took the level of crass and riots the drug causes a bit more. Still it brought back everything to a state of acceptance when the effect of those sheds away into a plot of believable redemption which might not convince every one but had a closure of its own. “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” while popularly be termed as a cult classic does not come to any conclusion rather continuously beats us with the excruciating madness of Duke and Dr. Gonzo.
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