The Doors (1991)

"Motel Money Murder Madness..."

This is Oliver Stone's best film, Val Kilmer's best performance, and the 2d best fiction film representation of a rock band (This Is Spinal Tap is the best, of course). But first, the bad news:
Stone's miscogyny nearly sinks the film. Morrison's significant other,Pamela Courson, was by all accounts, a tough as nails hippy chick who had the measure of her man. Jim was as devoted to her as he could be to a woman, and while both strayed often, they always came back to each other. Doors songs memorializing their relationship, like "Queen of the Highway," are a window into what Ray Manzarek termed a great love story. In the film, poor Meg Ryan (an excellent physical match for Pam) plays her as a nagging whiny scold, always trying to stop our hero from doing whatever it is a man's gotta do. Nothing could have been further from the truth, as Pam's refusal to put Jim on a leash was what kept them together. Her character is intolerable in the flick, just like Sissy Spacek's performance as Jim Garrison's wife in JFK and Daryl Hannah's in Wall Street, and is likely more representative of Stone's relationships with sundry long-suffering ex-wives than Pam and Jim. Stone's miscogny rears its ugly head again in his slander of Nico, the ethereal, brilliant ice goddess, here depicted as a balloon-breasted nekkid bimbo. Ugh.
These 2 dead women are sadly not around to kick Stone's butt for the injustice committed herein.
Second: for a movie called "The Doors," Robby Krieger, John Densmore, and Ray Manzarek are relegated to the background of the film. Morrison deferred to them in all matters artistic, and in return they provided him with a splendid musical carpet, backing his every unpredictable move every step of the way. While the film does justice to the music, it barely acknowledges the contribution of the musicians, without whom Morrison knew and acknowledged he was nothing. Character-wise, they seem like low-key versions of Pam, bemused and upset by Jim's antics where I suspect in real life they were enablers and facilitors and collaborators.

Now the good: perhaps because and not in spite of the fact Stone was stuck in the jungles of Vietnam while this story was being played out, as an imaginative re-creation of The Summer of Love and its dark aftermath, this film is nonpareil. Every detail of decor and costume, every location, seems dead-on accurate. [except for the fact that the women who pack the gigs look like they just tumbled off a casting couch...] I think Stone relished making up for the '60's he missed, and threw himself into the project with discipline and love. (Think of this as the homefront story playing out behind Platoon and Born on the 4th of July...)The concert scenes are phenomenal, orchestrated chaos spiraling out of control, while the ring-leader looks on with a bemused, ironic detatchment, not quite knowing what to make of the mindless Dionysian energies he has un-leashed in his audience.
Morrison speaks to Stone: both are products of the counterculture gestalt, both are artists who mix vast talent with vast pretension, excess, bombast, a boatload of drugs, and macho nonsense in equal measure. Stone's aesthetic failings are also Morrison's (great pop star/wretched poet), so the weaknesses of the film don't really hurt the movie, they make it seem more true to Mr Mojo Risin's messed up genius.
Finally -- Val Kilmer. This performance/incarnation is flat-out uncanny. Beyond capturing the obvious -- the looks, the voice, the stance, the charisma -- Kilmer also catches the irony and anti-star compulsions; his bemused role-playing when he poses for cheesecake photos for the cover of 16 magazine, his desire to shake up his audience by all the means at his disposal, his willful physical degeneration, pulling the plug on his Pop Star persona by turning himself into a tubby bearded wino/bluesman in record time. Kilmer never lets us forget Morrison was something of a clown, waiting and watching to see what would happen next when he ventured out further on the edge, appreciating the absurdity of the endeavor. Kilmer's sense of humor and self-mockery is what saves the movie from pretension, as it ultimately saves Morrison's art.

Formally, this movie initiated the chaotic visual style, expressionist psychedelic agit-prop, which Stone brought to fruition in subsequent films like JFK, Natural Born Killers, and Nixon. The film seems to careen out of control, but Stone's hand is firmly on the tiller. By the time we get to the legendary Miami concert that basically ended the band's career, with Kilmer/Morrison exhorting his equally whacked-out audience to follow him all the way, but clueless as to the destination, the swirling disembodied camera, perfectly re-created music, and wild montage really puts us in the heart of an epoch long past -- I really felt like i was there. Warts and all, a classic. August 19, 2008

Didn't quite light my fire...

My sister is a major fan of this movie, but in all honesty I am not a big fan of The Doors and so seeing the movie was not a huge priority of mine. After her incessant insisting I decided to give it a try though, and while I can't say that the experience was truly mind-blowing, I can say that I found some very entertaining moments in the film (especially when in regards to the acting).

As a whole I don't think that Oliver Stone's `The Doors' works well as a biopic. It never really gets inside the minds of its subjects. Its focus is clearly on frontman Jim Morrison and so the rest of the band just gets really nothing more than a passing glance. Honestly, I don't even remember hearing their names uttered in the film, which is not good for someone who is not familiar with the band since they won't be able to tell who is who. Stone truly only cares about one thing, and that is immortalizing Morrison. Thankfully he has Val Kilmer in the lead, and Val was utterly perfect as Morrison. I wish that the script would have given Kilmer a little more to chew on, for then his performance could have proved to be iconic, but even with the little he is given he manages to sink deep inside Morrison and bring to life his uncanny draw.

Stone is a very interesting director. I don't think that I have yet to be completely enamored with any one of his films; they always seem to be a bit off for me (I have yet to see `JFK' though, and I hear that is his finest film). He does a decent job of constructing this biopic, but in the end it feels a bit empty, as if we've really learnt nothing about this band, or even Morrison, aside from what he already has divulged to the known world. We never really get an intimate look at what made this man tick.

Stone does use some interesting techniques with this film that give the audience a feeling of being stoned almost, and I think that aspect of the film translates well with the given circumstances of the films focus, but those nice little tweaks are not enough to make up for the lackluster scripting.

A biopic of this nature should have a little more meat.

Regardless of what you feel about this film in general though, there is no denying that Val Kilmer delivers his career best performance, capturing the mannerisms and the massive appeal that was Jim Morrison. He transcended the box Stone kept him in and made himself as real as he could to the audience. At a mere glance his performance could come off as nothing more than imitation but there is an extra shimmer in his eyes that bleed through with a dedication that surpasses mimicry. I was also very impressed with Meg Ryan, who plays Morrison's girlfriend Pamela Courson. She has limited screen time but she manages to make her portrayal very honest and memorable. Her final moments with Kilmer are heartbreaking in their honesty.

`The Doors' is not the best biopic out there, but it has its moments and is enjoyable. It feels rather vapid when all is said and done (somewhat like `The Notorious Betty Page', which I recently reviewed) but like `Betty', `The Doors' lives and dies with one tremendous performance, and Kilmer's performance keeps this passable film breathing. August 15, 2008

3 1/2 stars...

This movie is okay, but it's just one huge fabrication. It is not to be taken seriously... August 9, 2008

Val Kilmer's best performance

Great music, great concert camera work, and great acting by Val Kilmer.
The only real negative is the focus on Lizard King persona, and not
enough real Jim. But overall worth watching w/ the volume set on high. August 6, 2008

An incredible ride

This was the part that Val Kilmer was born to play. The music in the movie just makes you trip away from the very beginning. It's fantastic. I love the Doors. This is a must have for any Door's fan. July 31, 2008

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