MY OWN PRIVATE IDAHO (1991) A Film Review by Ted Prigge Copyright 1998 Ted Prigge
Writer/Director: Gus Van Sant Starring: River Phoenix, Keanu Reeves, William Richert, James Russo, Rodney Harvey, Chiara Caselli, Michael Parker, Jessie Thomas, Flea, Grace Zubriskie, Tom Troupe, Udo Kier
I can't get that scene out of my mind. That one where River Phoenix (god rest his soul) is standing on that road in the middle or nowhere, supposedly in Idaho, looking around and seeing no signs of life or hope on either direction. He does this a bit more, then suddenly drops his bags, and falls asleep. Ever since I saw this film a couple days ago in one of my film classes (conveniently scheduled a mere three days after one of Van Sant's later films, a bit of selling out called "Good Will Hunting," won a couple of undeserved Oscars), I haven't been able to get it out of my mind.
"My Own Private Idaho" has been said to be an adaptation of Shakespeare's "King Henry IV Parts 1 and 2 (I think, or maybe just one of them). I've never read the play, but I have heard of it and read King Henry V, and I know that it's about King Henry V before he took his father's place as a king, and sold his friends out since he had to grow up. So as far as I know, this is a pretty straight adaptation of the play.
But it goes deeper than that. The main characters of King Henry IV are Prince Hal, later King Henry V, who is the character Scott (Keanu Reeves - surprisingly...no, shockingly effective) in this film; and Falstaff, the jolly poor man, who is the character Bob (William Richert) in this film. Yet our protagonist is a character named Mike (Phoenix - maybe his best performance), who is a narcaleptic (don't worry: the first shot is that of its definition in the dictionary).
What the film is trying to do is give us a nice drifting feel, designed to understand what it was like for Prince Hal to feel in King Henry IV, as he was wandering around. The film has no real plot, and often jumps around here and there at a moment's noice. We only know what occurs thanks to some conveniently placed occasional title cards, which never tell us how they arrived there, and it doesn't care either. At one point, we can be in a diner in Portland, and then suddenly, a title card saying "Idaho" pops up, and we're on a road in the middle of nowhere.
The center of this film is Mike, who as I've said is a narcoleptic, who falls asleep whenever he gets overstressed. Mike never has to deal with anything trivial in his life because everytime he gets to the height of his problem, he collapses. And when asleep, he has to rely on the kindness or unkindness of strangers. There's a scene where he collapses, and some of his friends help him to get a ride somewhere, and mention to the other, "this must be hard on his business."
Mike and Scott are hustlers, but at least Scott is heir to a fortune. Scott's father (James Russo), a mayor, has watched his beloved son become a hustler, and it's only a matter of town before Scott gives in, and settles down. Grows up. Matures. For Mike, there is none of this. He has to live life as it comes to him, haunted by his affliction. He's in direct contrast to Scott, and this is why their friendship is so powerful. Both of them are looking for something to cling onto, but for Mike, it's a harder bout. Scott can and does find some kind of love, and a reason to accept his father's wealth. If Mike could stay the hell awake, he could find something too, like his lost mother, whom he tries to locate on-and-off again throughout the film.
A film like this is not just about substance, but style as well. If played straight, this would have had depth, but been an awful cinematic experience. Gus Van Sant's direction gives us a film which is surreal as hell, reminiscent of "Midnight Cowboy" and a David Lynch film (of course, Van Sant actually gives the film substance, so you have to give him more credit). It's comedy doesn't come out of the surrealism, but out of the humans inhibiting it. The film has a great sense of humor, and Van Sant presents the film as having great comic timing. One scene I liked inparticular was a scene where a bloated customer is giving Mike a blow job, and as Mike comes, it cuts to a shot of a wooden cabin falling from the sky and crashing on the ground.
Various customers of theirs are extremely funny in that kind of off-kilter way, like a man who just really likes his apartment clean (I'm still laughing from this one), and a re-appearing character named Hans (Udo Kier, who is known to mainstream audiences as that rich guy in "Ace Ventura" part one), who at one point puts on a song that killed me the same way the karaoke scene in "Blue Velvet" did.
I've heard many dissection on this film. Some say it's just Shakepeare, Van Sant-style. Others say it's just crap (ugh). My film teacher introduced a take that said it was a condemnation of homsexuality. First off, Van Sant is openly gay. You do the math. But I can see where they're coming. The film shows that the hustlers do either sex, it doesn't matter, and at one point, Mike announces his love for Scott (they even pretend to have sex at one point - long story). And in the end, it kinda seems that homosexuality is shown as something that is pubescent, and is forgotten once the human being matures into an "adult." This would be alright...if the characters were gay.
Scott and Mike, despite a couple scene of homosexuality, are not gay people. They're: a) in it for the money and/or desperation; and b) just looking for someone to love, who will support them. If it's a guy, then fine. This is not a film about homosexuality. Why is it every time a character in a film is gay, it's said to be a "gay movie?" Yes, there's homosexuality in this movie, but it's just there. So what?
What "My Own Private Idaho" did for me was give 101 minutes of pure driftiness. There are countless scenes of people hanging around in diners, smoking cigarettes, drinking coffee, and talking about whatever, as they wait for something, anything to happen. The film jumps around in locale repeatedly, jolting us around every time we end up somewhere different, but have no idea how we got there (somehow Mike and Scott get to Italy). It's a film of pure mood, designed to get a reaction from the audience. What reaction? Well, mine was that you have to grow up sometime, mature, and take responsibility for yourself. It's a way of looking at the character Prince Hal from King Henry IV, and understanding what it was like for him during the whole time, and then contrast the two experiences.
There are times when it seems it would be so great to be Mike. To just go to sleep anytime times get extremely rough, and wake up and something new is waiting for you. Sure, people may steal from you, but who knows? You may make friends. And they may be gone the next time you wake up.
MY RATING (out of 4): ***1/2
Homepage at: http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Hills/8335/
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