Gus Van Sant’s cynical but never moralistic story about a junkie couple whose domestic life centres on the pursuit of drugs. Matt Dillon and Kelly Lynch are outstanding as a couple of drifters who are not afraid to state their love for the pleasurable highs that drugs offer: compared to the existences of other people they meet in small-town America, they don’t think they are doing so badly. Alternating between the comic and the bleak, “Drugstore Cowboy” reveals the excess and pain of drug addiction but its sharp, cool and irreverent tone never condescends to, or patronises the viewer. Features an hilarious cameo by William Burroughs as a smacked-out priest.
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Collection
In ACMI's collection
Credits
Collection metadata
ACMI Identifier
304328
Language
English
Audience classification
MA
Subject categories
Feature films → Feature films - United States
Food, Health, Lifestyle, Medicine, Psychology & Safety → Narcotic addicts
Sound/audio
Sound
Colour
Colour
Holdings
VHS; Access Print (Section 1)