Monday 23 May 2011

Anticipate Another Thompson Trip


An interesting character Hunter S. Thompson is. On reading his book, Songs of The Doomed; More Notes on the death of the American Dream, I discovered a renewed interest in films based on his life and works.

Films such as Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and some documentaries such as the film Breakfast With Hunter directed by Wayne Ewing. The list continues as Hunter charms and appalls. With this renewed interest I came across a film that is currently in production and scheduled for release in 2011. THis latest remake by director Bruce Robinson, is based on a Hunter S. Thompson novel, The Rum Diary. The novel's premise was presumably inspired by Thompson's own experiences in Puerto Rico. The fact that the film is casting Johnny Depp as the main character, Paul Kemp, does not come as a surprise as Depp has almost been established as Hunter in the eyes of many viewers who followed the dazed and spaces out Depp in Fear And Loathing in Las Vegas. IMDB confirms that the release date is indeed scheduled for 28 October 2011 in the USA. And the plot summary according to IMDB is included as such: “Paul Kemp is a freelance journalist who finds himself at a critical turning point in his life while writing for a run-down newspaper in the Caribbean. Paul is challenged on many levels as he tries to carve out a more secure niche for himself amidst a group of lost souls all bent on self-destruction”.

IMDB confirms that the release date is indeed scheduled for 28 October 2011 in the USA. Immediately a certain kind of anticipation manifests within me at the thought of yet another ‘Thompson trip’ that is bound to leave me obliviously cynical. Yet in some sick sense I look forward to re-realizing that I am yet but in an inevitably doomed void, just as my recurrently renewed interests in Thompson never fails to deliver me to such a state (If that makes sense).

No comments: