If I had no standards, I could just write the following and be done with this review:
This should not be a film. It's not a particularly cinematic story and no amount of madcap slapstick thrown in will change that.
Fortunately, I have standards. In spite of my initial reaction to The Rum Diary, I found the film to be funny and endearing in a not very film-friendly kind of way. It's difficult to explain. It comes down to liking the story but not how it was told, enjoying the characters and performers but not how they were used in the film.
Struggling writer Paul Kemp (a bland and inoffensive Johnny Depp) gets a job writing horoscopes and fluff pieces at the San Juan Star in Puerto Rico. Through the magic of office gossip, he gains the attention of Mr. Sanderson, a high-power business man trying to launch series of hotels on a soon to be disbanded military testing island. Sanderson wants Kemp to plant stories in the paper to make the development process easier.
Well, at least that's the plot that matters. The Rum Diary is more of an episodic cinematic journal rather than a narrative feature. Kemp gets drunk, Kemp gets in trouble, Kemp gets bailed out, Kemp becomes obsessed with something, Kemp gets shut down. Lather, rinse, repeat.
This is not a film you watch for the plot. You watch it for the mood and the supporting cast.
There is this really great energy onscreen in trying to capture the lives of writers who have given up on their own careers. The film is cynical about its topic but not its subjects. Each character has a richly developed background that seems to fit into the madness of San Juan's street riots and anti-tourist mentality. The rum of the title is poured heavily in every scene without casting judgment on the events of the film. It is the lifeblood that breeds the non-stop party atmosphere of the film.
The supporting cast in The Rum Diary is fantastic. The standout is Michael Rispoli as Sala. He plays this sarcastic, cynical, drunk, enterprising writer who is just trying to ride out the last months of the San Juan Star to get his pension and flee to Mexico. Rispoli fully embodies this role in a way that steals every scene he's in. He is the source of much of the film's humor. Aaron Eckhart and Amber Heard do solid work as the rich couple behind the development of the new hotel. Richard Jenkins gives great stressed out boss as the head of the newspaper. Marshall Bell has the most unpleasant character in the film--a perpetually drunk and disheveled religious reporter obsessed with Hitler--and manages to milk it for laughs and eventually empathy without overplaying the material.
The greatest asset and flaw of this film is Hunter S. Thompson's source novel. The film is slavishly loyal to the text, resulting in the decidedly un-cinematic quality of the film. It's like watching a novel come to life with no alterations to fit a visual medium. Only the die-hard Thompson fans are likely to enjoy the final cut of this film.
Rating: 4/10
Thoughts? Love to hear them.