Drugstore Cowboy (1989)

Sorry, this movie sucks

So much average

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Drugstore Cowboy was the film which put director Gus Van Sant on the map and for my money, it remains the best thing he has ever done. Set in the early 70's it is about a group of druggies who go around robbing chemists to feed their habits. The story is fairly basic, with the film being more character and dialogue driven. Matt Dillon puts in a tremendous performance of laid-back charisma as the leader of the group, in a role he was born to play. There is strong support also from Kelly Lynch as his hardened girlfriend and a young Heather Graham as the girl who pays the ultimate price for her association with this gang via an accidental overdose, an incident which the action in the story ultimately hinges on. There is also nice work too from James Remar as a cynical cop on Dillon's trail and William Burroughs as a veteran drug addict. Like most of the best drug films, it neither celebrates nor condemns the lifestyle and leaves the viewer to make up their minds themselves given the events depicted, although it has to be said that it definitely does not glamourize the individuals involved or their life-styles. In many respects this is a story about a dysfunctional family as much as anything. And as such it has quite an abundance of very effective humour. The flashback to the story about the dog and the whole 'hats on beds' thing being two good examples of the somewhat hilarious places this film goes at times. So, this is a movie which combines comedy and drama very well, with both complimenting each other, with the humour rounding the characters out and the serious drama anchoring us into the darker elements of their existence. In this respect, it would not be unrealistic to think of this as being a proto-type for the later British classic Trainspotting (1996). All-in-all, Drugstore Cowboy truly is one of the hidden gems of the 80's.

If it was not for this detail the movie would have been nothing special. But this changes everything - Bob finally gets it that you can fool the system but not some forces beyond and behind it. It is in fact a search for limits in this life and this world that the whole drug thing is about. And Bob understands that but will he survive? That is the question.

Directed by Gus Van Sant, who is credited here as Gus Van Sant, Jr. Matt Dillon heads A group of drug users(Future Ally McBeal star James Le Gros) the gorgeous Heather Graham , and Kelly Lynch as Dillons' wife. It's set in 1971 which the production designers have done a great job in recreating the past. The title refers to Dillon by robbing drug stores to finance their habit, Following a series of near misses and run ins with determined Cop James Remar, Dillon's character is very superstitious and eventually his luck runs out and eventually seeks rehabilitation Noted Author of 'Naked Lunch' William Burroughs also stars as a former Priest and addict who befriends Dillon during his solace spent during detox.

Gus Van Sant continues to dissect the American myth with "Drugstore Cowboy", a film which finds a character called Bob (Matt Dillon) attempting to lift himself out of a lowly lifestyle composed primarily of drugs and theft.But the aim here is not only to paint a portrait of a life hopelessly dependent on (or enslaved to) chemical gratification, but to lay bare the fiction of self-determination, a myth in which many Americans deludedly believe. As Bob mournfully says, all he can do is "try his best and see what happens". His life is so far out of his hands that it is practically somebody else's life, a fact which he observes throughout the film."Drugstore Cowboy" ends on an ambiguous note. After much toil and many attempts to reform, Bob finds himself being rushed to a hospital in an ambulance. Whether he lives or dies is left up to the audience. His fate, as always, is in somebody else's (ours) hands.8/10 – Too familiar and conventional to be great, too honest to be dismissed as typical Hollywood fare. Worth one viewing.