The movie: Kill Your Darlings (2013)
Directed by: John Krokidas
Starring: Daniel Radcliffe (Allen Ginsberg); Dane DeHaan (Lucien Carr); Michael C. Hall (David Kammerer); Jack Huston (Jack Kerouac); Ben Foster (William Burroughs); David Cross (Lou Ginsberg).
Kill Your Darlings follows a young Allen Ginsberg as he enters Columbia University and takes the first tentative steps in his poetry career. There he meets the irrepressible Lucien Carr, who introduces him to William Burroughs, and later Jack Kerouac. The four form a literary circle dedicated to "The New Vision" which focuses on, in Burrough's words, the "derangement of the senses." The gay Ginsberg immediately falls in love with the attractive and volatile Carr; but Carr already has an admirer, the intense, sinister professor-cum-janitor David Kammerer. Kammerer has pursued Carr from school to school, and appears to be merely a predator out to control Carr's life. But as Ginsberg becomes more entangled with Carr, he realizes his friend isn't as straightforward as he appears...
Joe (upon exiting to porch for smoke): I'm sorry, but that movie..."did somebody order a hot case of psychodrama?"
Rick (also on porch, lighting up): Yeah, I know. Sort of generic for a movie about nascent literary giants.
Joe: My biggest thing was, "Oh boy, a film featuring all your favorite authors...but here's Lucien Carr!" Who the fuck is Lucien Carr?!
Rick: It's an important episode, though - the embryo of the Beat movement. Carr was the catalyst that brought them together: no Lucien, no Beat circle.
Joe: But it wasn't really about them, was it? It was all about the relationships. You could switch in different characters and it'd be the same damn movie.
Rick: They were certainly "feeling some feels" in there...acting, anyone? It's like they barely had a chance to be clever or interesting before it's like, "Oops, time to emote again..."
Joe: I haven't seen that many thrusting jaws and trembling lower lips since the explosion at Jorgen's Facial Prosthetic Factory.
Rick: That was a shame. So many young lives.
(Here the reviewers pause to reflect sadly on the tragedy. Also to pour shots of Jack).
Joe: Ben Foster did a good Burroughs. Pretty spot-on.
Rick: I liked that he wasn't just doing an impression. He took the "essence" of Burroughs, and did his own thing.
Joe: I just didn't think he'd be so fucked up on drugs all the time, at least at that period...also, didn't the "cut-ups" come along in the 60's? After he met Brion Gyson.
Rick: I didn't know if the scene in Kammerer's library was precisely "cut-up", even if they did slice up the books. Anyway, the Dada movement did a lot of "cut up" poetry too...I think it happened several times, just the Burroughs/Gyson efforts were most famous.
Joe: I didn't really buy Harry Potter as Ginsberg. Hell, I didn't buy James Franco as Ginsberg in Howl...all dese Goys playin' Ginsberg, oy...but that David Cross, now he is Ginsberg.
Rick: He was Ginsberg in I'm Not There. He only appeared for a couple minutes, maybe two scenes.
Joe: Louis [Lucien Carr] looked just like his picture. So did the stalker guy [Kammerer].
Rick: I think that was made just for the movie...I haven't been able to find any good pictures of Kammerer. He was a bit of an enigma. I guess Michael C. Hall was as good a fit as any.
Joe: And then he shows up in the movie and I'm like, "Christ! It's Dexter! Run!"
Rick: He certainly has that creepy predator vibe going. Although he dials it down to about 2 or 3.
Joe: But Jack Huston as Kerouac? Granted, I like Jack Huston a lot, but he wasn't quite the actor to play Kerouac. And what was up with that New Yawk accent?
Rick: Y'know Jack - he's a straight guy, on da level, good yegg from da 'nabe, real squeah deal-type...from Brooklyn...?
Joe: More like a French Canadian from Lowell, Massachusetts.
(Here they pause to appraise another fine vintage of distilled corn excretions through the medium of tiny glasses).
Rick: I think what ground my gears a bit was how they portrayed the whole "noncomformist" thing in the college. It was a bit like, "Oh those wacky college kids" - superiors raising their eyebrows and being condescending and suchlike, while our rebellious rebels revel in rebellion...you get what I mean?
Joe: No stakes. You don't get a sense of the crushing weight of the institution, of how badly they were trying to break out of the rut. They made the whole "New Vision" seem like Ginsberg's attempt to suck up to Carr - I mean, you don't really get a feel for his creative frustration, other than that he mentions Whitman in class and doesn't like Ogden Nash.
Rick: Speaking of stakes, did you get a sense that gay repression was soft-pedaled a bit?
Joe: Well, they did take those guys out of the bar...and there was the whole "honor-slaying" bit. I felt like it was in there - did they need to spell it out?
Rick: I guess you're right; I just thought it would be more blatant. Maybe because it was the 40's...I kept forgetting - the War sort of pokes its head in every so often, but you don't get a sense of the broader picture...anyway, the authorities had more important things to do than queer-bash. In the 50's, now, that's when they really started cracking down - FBI raids and such.
Joe: The movie didn't really establish the timeframe that well - references to the war seemed plonked in there. The rest of it felt like a mishmash: Burroughs from the 20's, everybody else from the 50's, Kammerer from the early 60's.
...One thing I did like, though, was the soundtrack. They had a couple good ones in there.
Rick: I liked that they didn't just play period music, ad nauseum, like some kinda friggin' nostalgia film. I liked the TV on the Radio song during the library heist.
Joe: Overall, I guess it was okay...I'd much rather have watched Howl, though. A movie about Ginsberg that actually, you know...focuses on Ginsberg.
Summary: An all-star cast turns in some great performances in a stylishly-presented buddy movie/coming of age story/gay psychodrama...oh, and there's some Beat stuff in there, too. And somebody gets stabbed. Kill Your Darlings does itself a disservice by downplaying the literary and cultural revolution, and ramping up the melodrama to 11. You never really get a feel for the time or setting; it jumps from genre to genre, even trying its hand at crime drama for thirty seconds before dropping it. And what's at stake in the characters' noncomformity? Ultimately, for a pair of Beat-obsessed artists named Rick and Joe, an annoying disappointment.
Directed by: John Krokidas
Starring: Daniel Radcliffe (Allen Ginsberg); Dane DeHaan (Lucien Carr); Michael C. Hall (David Kammerer); Jack Huston (Jack Kerouac); Ben Foster (William Burroughs); David Cross (Lou Ginsberg).
Kill Your Darlings follows a young Allen Ginsberg as he enters Columbia University and takes the first tentative steps in his poetry career. There he meets the irrepressible Lucien Carr, who introduces him to William Burroughs, and later Jack Kerouac. The four form a literary circle dedicated to "The New Vision" which focuses on, in Burrough's words, the "derangement of the senses." The gay Ginsberg immediately falls in love with the attractive and volatile Carr; but Carr already has an admirer, the intense, sinister professor-cum-janitor David Kammerer. Kammerer has pursued Carr from school to school, and appears to be merely a predator out to control Carr's life. But as Ginsberg becomes more entangled with Carr, he realizes his friend isn't as straightforward as he appears...
Joe (upon exiting to porch for smoke): I'm sorry, but that movie..."did somebody order a hot case of psychodrama?"
Rick (also on porch, lighting up): Yeah, I know. Sort of generic for a movie about nascent literary giants.
Joe: My biggest thing was, "Oh boy, a film featuring all your favorite authors...but here's Lucien Carr!" Who the fuck is Lucien Carr?!
Rick: It's an important episode, though - the embryo of the Beat movement. Carr was the catalyst that brought them together: no Lucien, no Beat circle.
Joe: But it wasn't really about them, was it? It was all about the relationships. You could switch in different characters and it'd be the same damn movie.
Rick: They were certainly "feeling some feels" in there...acting, anyone? It's like they barely had a chance to be clever or interesting before it's like, "Oops, time to emote again..."
Joe: I haven't seen that many thrusting jaws and trembling lower lips since the explosion at Jorgen's Facial Prosthetic Factory.
Rick: That was a shame. So many young lives.
(Here the reviewers pause to reflect sadly on the tragedy. Also to pour shots of Jack).
Joe: Ben Foster did a good Burroughs. Pretty spot-on.
Rick: I liked that he wasn't just doing an impression. He took the "essence" of Burroughs, and did his own thing.
Joe: I just didn't think he'd be so fucked up on drugs all the time, at least at that period...also, didn't the "cut-ups" come along in the 60's? After he met Brion Gyson.
Rick: I didn't know if the scene in Kammerer's library was precisely "cut-up", even if they did slice up the books. Anyway, the Dada movement did a lot of "cut up" poetry too...I think it happened several times, just the Burroughs/Gyson efforts were most famous.
Joe: I didn't really buy Harry Potter as Ginsberg. Hell, I didn't buy James Franco as Ginsberg in Howl...all dese Goys playin' Ginsberg, oy...but that David Cross, now he is Ginsberg.
Rick: He was Ginsberg in I'm Not There. He only appeared for a couple minutes, maybe two scenes.
Joe: Louis [Lucien Carr] looked just like his picture. So did the stalker guy [Kammerer].
Rick: I think that was made just for the movie...I haven't been able to find any good pictures of Kammerer. He was a bit of an enigma. I guess Michael C. Hall was as good a fit as any.
Joe: And then he shows up in the movie and I'm like, "Christ! It's Dexter! Run!"
Rick: He certainly has that creepy predator vibe going. Although he dials it down to about 2 or 3.
Joe: But Jack Huston as Kerouac? Granted, I like Jack Huston a lot, but he wasn't quite the actor to play Kerouac. And what was up with that New Yawk accent?
Rick: Y'know Jack - he's a straight guy, on da level, good yegg from da 'nabe, real squeah deal-type...from Brooklyn...?
Joe: More like a French Canadian from Lowell, Massachusetts.
(Here they pause to appraise another fine vintage of distilled corn excretions through the medium of tiny glasses).
Rick: I think what ground my gears a bit was how they portrayed the whole "noncomformist" thing in the college. It was a bit like, "Oh those wacky college kids" - superiors raising their eyebrows and being condescending and suchlike, while our rebellious rebels revel in rebellion...you get what I mean?
Joe: No stakes. You don't get a sense of the crushing weight of the institution, of how badly they were trying to break out of the rut. They made the whole "New Vision" seem like Ginsberg's attempt to suck up to Carr - I mean, you don't really get a feel for his creative frustration, other than that he mentions Whitman in class and doesn't like Ogden Nash.
Rick: Speaking of stakes, did you get a sense that gay repression was soft-pedaled a bit?
Joe: Well, they did take those guys out of the bar...and there was the whole "honor-slaying" bit. I felt like it was in there - did they need to spell it out?
Rick: I guess you're right; I just thought it would be more blatant. Maybe because it was the 40's...I kept forgetting - the War sort of pokes its head in every so often, but you don't get a sense of the broader picture...anyway, the authorities had more important things to do than queer-bash. In the 50's, now, that's when they really started cracking down - FBI raids and such.
Joe: The movie didn't really establish the timeframe that well - references to the war seemed plonked in there. The rest of it felt like a mishmash: Burroughs from the 20's, everybody else from the 50's, Kammerer from the early 60's.
...One thing I did like, though, was the soundtrack. They had a couple good ones in there.
Rick: I liked that they didn't just play period music, ad nauseum, like some kinda friggin' nostalgia film. I liked the TV on the Radio song during the library heist.
Joe: Overall, I guess it was okay...I'd much rather have watched Howl, though. A movie about Ginsberg that actually, you know...focuses on Ginsberg.
Summary: An all-star cast turns in some great performances in a stylishly-presented buddy movie/coming of age story/gay psychodrama...oh, and there's some Beat stuff in there, too. And somebody gets stabbed. Kill Your Darlings does itself a disservice by downplaying the literary and cultural revolution, and ramping up the melodrama to 11. You never really get a feel for the time or setting; it jumps from genre to genre, even trying its hand at crime drama for thirty seconds before dropping it. And what's at stake in the characters' noncomformity? Ultimately, for a pair of Beat-obsessed artists named Rick and Joe, an annoying disappointment.
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