_______________ VIVA LAS VEGAS BY CINTRA WILSON (05/22/98)
	The other night I sat in an audience mostly made of people half my age watching a movie version of a book that has survived as a definitive classic of my own generation, and I was bored. Oddly, the enthusiasm of these youngsters for all of this rehashed nostalgia was unbounded. I had to ask some deep questions about where I stand and what has brought me here. I am nearly 50. My formative years were those depicted in Hunter S. Thompson's over-the-top masterpiece, "Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas." I have experimented with, at one time or another, most of the substances mentioned in the book, and taken part in a good deal of "over-the-top," close-to-the-edge, drug-influenced behavior. I even made it to Woodstock. I've read several times and thoroughly enjoyed Thompson's novel, and in fact have read almost every word the author has published. For me, Thompson remains, in some sense, the clearest echo of the wild aspirations and incredible sense of possibility that characterized those times and events. So, what's the deal? Terry Gilliam's movie follows the novel faithfully, even slavishly, with almost no distortion or revision. Johnny Depp goes all out in his stylistic depiction of the Thompson character. The production is visually interesting and seems intent on capturing the insane manic energy of Thompson's prose. Why did I find the movie so depressingly dull? Partially it's the difficulty of translating prose to film. For me the genius of "Fear and Loathing" is less in the story than in the prose. Although the film is liberally dosed with voice-over passages from the book, the transposition of Thompson's inspired language into pre-cut images inevitably diminishes the author's ability to trigger an imaginative response in the audience. We are repeatedly reminded that this is a tale about things that happened long ago. It is all about nostalgia. The film makes little or no effort to place events in any kind of context that is relevant to the present. Hunter S. Thompson's own cameo as a pickled patron of a '60s bar contributes to the general sense of nostalgia, as do repeated shots of television screens filled with images of bombings and demonstrations. No attempt was made to integrate these images with anything else we encounter in the film. Thompson, above all else, is a political writer whose every paragraph is a conscious attempt to assault the enduring complacency of the middle-American status quo. His prose is as alive and urgent in the present as it was when it was written. This film turns his work into little more than an updated version of "Animal House," a not so cute comedic parody of the charming and anarchistic irresponsibility of times gone by. For a brief moment in the '60s, the children of the middle class identified with other, less privileged people in the world, got a clear whiff of the ominous shadow of the Big Machine and took collective action against what were seen as the forces of evil. The events of that time were seen as part of an all or nothing struggle that didn't emerge out of nothing and didn't end when the decade was over. The drugs and anarchy and excess were only one aspect of an explosion of events and catalysts. They brought to full expression a need to break out of the straitjacket world of the post-World War II imperialist suburban mentality. They were never, ultimately, the point. Even in a story like "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," so thoroughly steeped in drugs and alcohol and noxious behavior, Thompson shows us that the struggle has continuity with the past and the future. In many ways, with all of its hilarity, the book is an expression of the numbing anguish and disappointment many of us felt when we realized that what we experienced as a moment of incredible magic and unbounded expression had finally come to an end. Thompson himself never surrenders to the utter nihilism and self-destructive despair that constantly threatens in these times to get the upper hand, as can be seen if one reads anything he has written since. In the context of the present, "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," the movie, comes off as just another fashionable attempt to re-create and trivialize a past that never actually existed, the expression of a strange nostalgia for a world that never really was. If I were Thompson and were still lucid I would absolutely detest this film. -- Ralph E. Melcher
_______________ PUNCH DRUNK BY VIVIAN GORNICK (05/27/98)
	I enjoyed reading Vivian Gornick's article about Norman Mailer. I have never read a book by Mailer -- for me his books are unreadable. I enjoy listening to Mailer speak because I like his anger, I like his vulnerability (shown in his wayward attacks). Mailer really is a lot of huff and puff, isn't he? Gornick makes a serious point about Mailer's "poison" and how this is not handled correctly by Mailer. I quite agree. I also agree that anger is not handled particularly well, or harnessed effectively, by Martin Amis, among others. However, I would disagree that this somehow constitutes "failure." The failure is merely technical, not spiritual. Orwell was not writing "about the same time" as Mailer. Orwell is in a completely different category, of a different generation and concerned with different problems than Mailer. Orwell is dealing with horror (totalitarianism), not just "anger." Orwell was angry, though, and I agree he harnessed his anger to great literary effect. Good writing, of course, comes from good thinking -- as Orwell himself pointed out. -- Gary Heath
_______________ RETURN OF THE HEX-CRAZED WARGAMERS BY ANDREW LEONARD (05/29/98)
	I have just finished reading the article on wargaming, and I thought that I should drop a line and offer my commendations for a well-written, thoughtful story. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I can't, however, let Jim Dunnigan's typically garrulous rantings go unanswered. The man has to stop viewing the wargame hobby through ancient eyes. If those hoary old SPI reader feedback stats are thrown in my face one more time I fear I shall have to personally sabotage his wayback machine. Ninety percent of wargamers content to play solitaire? It strains my credulity to believe so of gamers at any time, let alone now. Sure, I enjoy playing a game of solitaire; I just enjoy it 100 times more when I have a human opponent to interact with. I'm certainly not unique in this regard, and judging from the local gamers in my area, I'm the norm. I have even enticed people to travel from the United States to Canada to stay for a week at my fishing camp and play wargames -- people that I met through Consim-L and other Internet resources. Wargaming is dead. Long live wargaming! -- Darren Reid SALON | June 3, 1998