Heavy handed, to say the least

Rating: 5/10 (17 July 2007)

I have to admit that, not being a particularly huge Oliver Stone fan, I went into this movie with a certain amount of skepticism. I will also admit that this was one of those movies that I rented because I knew it ended morbidly. As far as biopics go, it's pretty typical--sex, drugs, rock and roll, all the usual things people like to experience vicariously, all executed with Stone's characteristically leaden hand. There were scenes I fast-forwarded. There are some (very) prolonged acid-trip scenes, and the only thing they made me realize is that Oliver Stone has never dropped acid. There is, for the most part, very little character development, with Jim Morrison portrayed as the drug-addled, misunderstood and frankly quite annoying visionary, his girlfriend as your standard nagging wife figure who holds back said visionary, and the other three Doors members as, well, totally interchangeable and expendable. I just couldn't admire the character of Jim at all, I think his portrayal could have been handled a lot better; he could have been made into a much more well-developed, sympathetic and admirable guy instead of the spoiled, egotistical moron that Stone favored. And that's not saying I'm not a Doors fan. I am. All I'm saying is that if the portrayal is true to life at all, Jim Morrison may have survived a little longer if there had been someone sensible to punch him in the mouth from time to time.