I became very intrigued about Dennis Hopper right after his death, some days ago. Therefore i started to investigate about the movies that Hopper has done. I started to look on www.imdb.com and found this movie. I saw tiny bits of it in www.youtube.com but not enough to get at complete picture og the plot. What is it about this movie? Is Dennis Hopper good in it? Is there anywhere to purchase it and is it worth the money?
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Well worth watching; a mess in places, but worth it just to see Hopper and Stockwell at their best....
I became interested in the movie the same way as you did and I ended up buying it the day after his death along with a few other classic Hopper films. Anyway I thought this film was practically a masterpiece, Hopper and Stockwell are perfectly cast as is everyone else. If you like Dennis Hopper films then you should like this one. I was amazed that I hadn't heard of it before, it seems like it should be a criterion collection release.
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Yes, CoolHandLuke, it's a powerful film, jarring and sad but well made and beautifully performed. The movie's transition involves watching a basically nice guy sink into complete unbridled madness. As he does, the movie becomes more and more hallucinatory. It's a seething, scathing commentary on what Vietnam did to its (often well-meaning) enlistees. And the ending is a heller.
My only criticism of it is that the comedic asides on the train (between Norman, Emil, others) seem like unnecessary distractions, and tonally violate the surrounding film. I think that, had Jaglom limited the material to Hopper and Power and Stockwell, the movie would have been even better. But this is a minor criticism. See it!
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Jaglom's soundtrack was a fascinating metaphor contrasting the popularity of WWII and Vietnam Wars. The film is filled with WWII popular songs throughout. I saw this movie a couple of times in the late 70's, but it is a hard film to find, but well worth a look. One of the most touching points made was near the end in a scene between Stockwell and Hopper. In essence, it illustrated the alienation between males of the the same age who could well have been friends, but were divided politically on the merits of Vietnam.
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