Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson

120 mins - 2008.

Hunter S Thompson is not someone I knew an awful lot about. I mean, I knew he was a journalist and that his distinctive approach came to be known as ‘Gonzo Journalism’ and I knew he had a reputation for copious drug-taking, but really that’s about it. Gonzo is a documentary, splicing together archive footage and (confusingly) bits of Terry Gilliam’s film version of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas with interviews with people who knew him. The fact that the documentary is narrated by Johnny Depp, who played Thompson in that film, adds a further layer to the confusion. Most interesting to me is the account of how Thompson came to cover the 1972 US election campaign (later published as Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail) and how close he came to be to those in power. Here was this eccentric, drug-addled gun-toting journalist being spoken of warmly by such as ex-president Jimmy Carter and 1972 Democratic candidate Jimmy McGovern. One struggles to imagine Jim Callaghan or Michael Foot being interested in participating in a similar documentary about a (hypothetical) British equivalent.

Ultimately, it’s a sad story that is being told. Hunter S Thompson’s first wife, Sondi Wright, says at the beginning that in essence, his story is a tragic one, and it’s true. If the film is to be believed, he never really topped his early 70s work, and found that, once he became known, it got in the way of the kind of ‘gonzo’ reportage with which he made his name. In his later years, he seemed to slip into a kind of self-parody, and Gonzo does not shrink from showing this. So, should you go see this film? If the subject matter intrigues you, I’d say yes. If, on the other hand, you couldn’t care less about the life and works of Hunter S Thompson, I doubt this is the documentary to change your mind.