THE DOORS
A film review by Steve Tenney
Copyright 1991 Steve Tenney
Yes, after watching Oliver Stone's (an appropriate last name for the director of this movie) THE DOORS, you remember it even if you really weren't there :-)!
I saw the Doors at Avalon Ballroom in San Francisco back in 1968 (or was it 67). At that time we were really into the San Francisco Sound--a la Big Brother and the Holding Company (with Janis), Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead, the Sons of Chaplin, Moby Grape, QuickSilver Messenger Service, etc. So on this one night when this LA Band showed up on stage, with Morrison and his black leather pants (hey-- we were more into knee-high leather moccasins, paisley shirts and stuff), slithering across the stage on his belly while reciting his "poetry" (Dylan was more my kind of poet), we had rather mixed feelings about the experience. Somehow The Doors just didn't fit into the atmosphere in old Avalon Ballroom that night. Somehow you really got the impression that Morrison was on a less-than-healthy trip, so in '71 when I heard of his death I wasn't surprised at all.
I really "dug" this Oliver Stone movie, even though I found it somewhat depressing. Naturally, a movie about the self-destruction of a rock hero during a very turbulent age would tend to be depressing. I found myself trying to sift from this movie any positive memories of that era I could. There were many positive idealist, though naive, aspects of the counter-culture movement, especially around the San Francisco Bay Area. But unfortunately that movement was born by drugs and eventually died by drugs.
The Doors was brilliantly filmed, acted and directed, and caught the very strange, exciting and destructive character of that time. It's probably a movie you will either want to see three or four times or else.... not even once, depending on your taste and background.
Steve Tenney Hewlett-Packard Corvallis, ORE 10e@hpcvia.CV.HP.COM
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