When I was in college, a member of the Doors came to speak. I think it was Ray Manzarek. My knowledge of music is, even now, pretty skimpy, but a lot of my friends were going, so I did too. It was a good talk. He spoke about his experiences with the band, his memories of Jim Morrison, and quite a bit about the then-recent movie from director Oliver Stone. Granted, I sort of wanted to ask him if he saw the Jim Morrison character in Wayne’s World 2, but he didn’t see me so that may be a good thing.
Then again, I didn’t see the movie until recently. I find Oliver Stone’s movies, with the exception of Platoon, a bit much. Maybe this time will be different.
Framed with a device suggesting Val Kilmer’s Jim Morrison may somehow be putting the movie together himself, the film flashes through Morrison’s life as he drops out of film school, meets on-again, off-again partner Pamela Courson (Meg Ryan), and eventually teams up with the rest of the guys who became the Doors to sing some psychedelic songs that made them hugely famous while Morrison’s own behavior got them things like banned by the Ed Sullivan show, losing gigs due to bizarre antics, and ruining his personal life due to constant straying. When the other members of the band appear in the movie, they are often seen trying to actually be professional, perform shows, record, or generally just put music together while Morrison, well, does whatever he feels like.
Despite the title, this movie, like Bohemian Rhapsody is much more about the lead singer than the other members of the band. They get little bits here and there, but the focus is clearly on the band’s most memorable and (in)famous member. However, unlike Bohemian Rhapsody, this one doesn’t really act as a redemption arc for Morrison the way the other movie did for Freddy Mercury. The redemption arc, obviously, is more of a cliche for musical biopics these days, where the troubles the artist experiences and causes are overcome in order to do a big performance at the end of the movie. But here, well, Jim Morrison doesn’t seem to need a redemption arc. Near the end of the movie, he attends a birthday party for the child of one the band members, and the four members of the band all seem to be getting along fine, but there’s no moment where Jim stops to think maybe he should be a better friend or something. He just thinks his whole life has been, in his own words, a long, strange journey.
I have commented in the past on director Oliver Stone’s lack of subtly. If he has ever made a movie that wasn’t blatantly obvious in what it was trying to say, I don’t think I have seen it. The Doors is no different. However, this, like Platoon, is a case where Stone’s excesses work to the film’s advantage. Aside from a brief scene in the beginning of the movie showing his childhood, it does seem as if Morrison is high on something for the entire film, and if we’re seeing Jim Morrison’s life through the eyes of this Jim Morrison, that does seem highly appropriate. He’s a man who bought into every aspect of the 60s counterculture, and he was something of an asshole as a result of his own excesses. The movie doesn’t exactly make a saint out of him or even explain why he was the way he was, but it does show a bit of his mindset. He was more a poet than a singer, and as a symbol of the age, he fits.
Much was made at the time of release on how much actor Val Kilmer looked like Jim Morrison. I’m not overly familiar with the real Morrison, but that does seem to be an accurate statement. Kilmer shines here, showing a Morrison who may be too out of it to see how he’s causing most of his own problems and probably not even caring all that much regardless. He doesn’t seem to be malicious, but he also isn’t all that cuddly. If there’s a word for this character, it is simply this: fascinating. It’s easy to see why people fell into his orbit, even as it is easy to see why so many eventually fell out of it. I don’t know that this Jim Morrison is as deep as he maybe thinks he is, but Stone found a way to tell his story in a way that fits the music the singer is known for. It’s trippy, poetic, and altogether in its own way, timeless.
Grade: B+
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