Before Hunter S. Thompson wreaked havoc at every hotel in Las Vegas in between mescaline trips, he downed shots of rum and turned over hotel minibars in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

The novel ‘The Rum Diary,’ written by Thompson in the early 1960s but not published until 1998, remains one of the defining works of the father of gonzo journalism. The film adaptation of Thompson’s ‘Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,’ though a failure upon initial release, is a cult classic. The film adaptation of ‘The Rum Diary,’ written and directed by Bruce Robinson, may have trouble reaching this legendary status. It fails to capture the obsessive, detailed beauty of the brilliant, rebel author’s writing.

Johnny Depp once again plays the role of Thompson, this time under the pseudonym of Paul Kemp. Kemp, an alcoholic American expatriate from New York, flees to Puerto Rico, where he finds a job as a writer for a failing newspaper.

‘The Rum Diary’ is the story of how Thompson became a great journalist. At the beginning, he can’t find his voice as a writer. By the end, he realizes he must use his voice to fight against the injustices he finds. The movie only gets halfway into fully developing this point. If you want to see a truly great portrayal of the effect of Thompson’s writing, watch ‘Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson’ instead.

Another part of the movie involves Kemp’s encounter with Sanderson (Aaron Eckhart), a rich American businessman living in Puerto Rico with his beautiful lover Chenault (Amber Heard), the source of Kemp’s affection. Sanderson’s plan to develop a resort on beachfront property feels more like the plot of a ‘80s comedy than a fully developed representation of Thompson’s first battle against the ‘bastards’ of capitalism.

Since stumbling upon the original manuscript of ‘The Rum Diary,’ Depp has always been fascinated with Thompson, and turning this book into a movie has always been a passion project for him. In his performance, Depp captures the essence of Thompson through his mumbled voice. Despite almost always being drunk or under the influence of a strange drug introduced to him, he always has a put-together demeanor.

Meanwhile, as the disgruntled and out-of-his-mind Moburg, Giovanni Ribisi steals every scene with his lightning-fast intensity and hilarious characterization. As the fiery and colorful Lotterman, Richard Jenkins deserves more screen time. Sanderson’s intended cartoonish persona and two-dimensional nature makes it difficult for Eckhart to do much with the character, and Heard’s performance of the entrancing Chenault comes off as more dull than enticing.

Although the film is supposed to be about Thompson’s quest to find his voice, it ends up being a squeaky-clean, Hollywood version of ‘The Rum Diary.’ Though the film is entertaining, it lacks both Thompson’s insight and indignation. The greatest absence from the film: the novel’s haunting final lines, which embody Thompson’s emulation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s writing style. These words could have been said in a final voiceover, or perhaps represented by one image. Instead, the film resorts to a tidy epilogue instead of exploring the more indefinite freedom of the original story.

And this marks the movie’s biggest problem: capturing the novel’s mood and Thompson’s style of journalism, driven by individual feelings rather than objectivity. In ‘Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,’ the bright lights and ringing slot machines of Las Vegas mask the emptiness of the American Dream. In ‘The Rum Diary,’ Puerto Rico looks exciting and pretty, but the tropical paradise conceals the pervasive lies of those in power.

When the ‘Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas’ movie replicated the book’s famed ‘wave speech’ on screen, it did exactly what Thompson intended with his novel. It stripped away the layers of the beast and made him relatable while simultaneously justifying a countercultural generation. It’s hard to compare these two stories, as they were written at two very different times in Thompson’s life. But when you strip away the layers of ‘The Rum Diary’ that Depp and Robinson attempt to recreate, there is nothing but a hollow center.

iaphilli@syr.edu

Published on November 1, 2011 at 12:00 pm