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We can't stop here, this is bat country: Hunter S Thompson
Journey through the life and times of a counterculture hero
Writer Tim Crouse describes the subject of Alex Gibney's Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson as someone who "captured certain truths about human perversity". Thompson's first wife Sandi says he had "the passion to move people and make them act", while former Hell's Angels president Sonny Barger calls him "a jerk" but concedes he was also "a very good writer".
Gibney - who won an Oscar for Taxi to the Dark Side - blends archival footage, home movies, audiotapes and narration by Johnny Depp into a dizzying portrait of the rabble-rousing icon of individualism. Thompson was the original 'gonzo' journalist (a term coined by his cohort and friend Bill Cardoso), whose stories were overshadowed by the storyteller himself.
Screening in Long Play, Gibney's film traces Thompson's career - from his early beginnings when he used to type The Great Gatsby word-for-word to teach himself about writing techniques, to the year he spent riding with (and pissing off) the Hells Angels, to his travels with Democratic nominee George McGovern during the 1972 US presidential campaign, and finally, to his suicide in 2005.
The film's list of interviewees reads like a roll call of defining cultural and political figures of the 1960s and 70s. Thompson once wrote, "In a nation of frightened dullards, there is always a sorry shortage of outlaws, and those few who make the grade are always welcome".
What Gibney's film confirms is that Hunter S. Thompson, literary and cultural outlaw, was welcome indeed.
Gonzo is screening until Tuesday 4 November. For full screening details click here
Published Thursday, 23 October 2008
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