Horrible stuff..

Rating: 1/10 (15 April 2006)

Entertaining in parts, but as a whole it's pure manure.
This movie is generally about the sociopath Richard( DiCaprio),in his elitist pursuit of pleasure, sex and holiday paradise. He goes to great length in pursuing this, using lies, deceit and violence to get what he wants. He gets to know about a secluded Thai beach, and makes friends with a french guy and his girlfriend in order to steal the girlfriend from the guy.. The trio finds their "paradise" on an island that's part occupied by some armed and crazy Thai marijuana farmers, and the other part; a crazy hippie collective . The hippies are driven by a collective fear of getting their tropical paradise discovered, so they use fascistic methods when silencing members of the society to not reveal the secrets of the whereabouts of their beautiful beach/self made tropical paradise "community".
The hippie commune, is still a slave to consumerism society, and not the alternative society that it is set out to be. Just like Richard, the members of the community goes to great length in defending their right to "fun" and "pleasure", taking a blind fold to the ones that get hurt and killed in their pursuit. The goal of the commune is elitist and fascist, the means of using violence is motivated by keeping out other tourists and people the commune doesn't want out of this beach-resort. Richard makes everything he can to do the same things. He is everything that goes bad with the commune inpersonated.. He's not able to feel any empathy or understanding for anyone, the only time he openly questions the fascism of the commune is when his own life is on the line in order to save it. In other cases he walks away, and still "feels good being in paradise".
Well the movies meaning wasn't supposed to be about this. The director somehow thought that we should see any kind of sympathy and actually care about what happens to Richard, and forgive him for his actions, instead he is the only guy in this movie that is actually disgustingly inhumane. Maybe he thought we should have been blazed by the star quality of Di Caprio. But truthfully, He is nothing more than a stupid parody of idiotic travellers who think they can behave anyhow they like in any foreign exotic location. The unintentional satire is exaggerating this, making him a total psychopath. He is not just a someone who quietly takes orders, the nazi-like leader of the commune; Sal is his peer. The same person, but with power.
DiCaprios character is somebody you would want the director to have shot off early in the movie. Even if it was the meaning of the director to show DiCaprio as a total a-hole, this a-hole definitely isn't good company for the two hours. This is not the only bad thing about the movie. It's slow scenes, extremely bad computer animations and the horribly outdated brit-pop soundtrack makes it an equally painful experience to watch.
The movies ending is nothing but Richard being nostalgic about his beach adventures in his normal-life setting, not having learned any lesson or gained any emotional strength. The viewer is also encouraged to join his nostalgia for his blood stained paradise.
Why go to such great lengths anyway to get away from the mass tourists? Go to the Philipines or any place that isn't as crowded as Thailand. Stupid movie.