The American Dreamer

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Audience Member Some occasional nice looking footage but Hopper and the hack director are insufferable. Rated 2/5 Stars •  Rated 2 out of 5 stars 02/17/23 Full Review delysid d idiotic forgotten film that was forgotten for a good reason, because it stinks Rated 1/5 Stars •  Rated 1 out of 5 stars 03/22/19 Full Review Audience Member Unimaginative documentary about a pretentious, boring, sexist dude. So disappointing. I was expecting real insights into the process of The Last Movie being made, instead we got Hopper rambling his 'philosophy' and talking over women and not much else. Would've got 1 star except some of the music was good and the wardrobe was undoubtedly amazing. Rated 2/5 Stars •  Rated 2 out of 5 stars 02/10/23 Full Review Audience Member This near legendary documentary about Dennis Hopper struggling - or more like avoiding - to complete the near legendary "The Last Movie" unfortunately falls flat on many levels. The production is amateurish, the music truly awful and the subject comes across as a babbling Manson wannabee - even at one point giving a semi-glowing appraisal of the man himself. Hopper brags that he doesn't like reading - that reading "does nothing for him" and that to experience life is the only real education anyone ever needs. Not sure how much he experienced back here in 1971 through the thick fog of drugs but it does shed light on to why "The Last Movie" turned out such a jumbled (though far superior to this film) pretentious mess. Definitely worth a view for Hopper fanatics but hardly deserving a second screening. Rated 1.5/5 Stars •  Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars 01/30/23 Full Review eric b An underground documentary about Dennis Hopper at the peak of his hippie-era hedonism sounds exciting but, unfortunately, "The American Dreamer" doesn't live up to its potential. As the film opens, Hopper has just finished shooting "The Last Movie" (a notorious bomb, following the landmark "Easy Rider"), and is amidst editing it and haggling with the studio about its content and release date. But such movie-biz issues comprise only a small portion of the film. Shaggy and thin, he's living in a desert town somewhere with other like-minded free spirits. We see him walking, driving, bathing, eating, flirting and kissing, but mostly he just philosophizes. Mind you, he has interesting things to say and doesn't come off like some rambling, incoherent stoner. He's actually quite introspective, and his articulate language confirms that his vacuous "Easy Rider" character was simply a role. (In fact, he offers a surprisingly cynical view that Billy was really no better than the rednecks who shot him -- they were just criminals of a different flavor.) But Hopper's musings grow tiresome, and there is little sense of capturing any natural reality, because everyone is so conspicuously aware of the camera's presence. Explicit quarrels about the crew's effect on behavior are even left in the film. The print I saw was brownish, faded and fuzzy, and the action contains far too many montages backed with forgotten, dated folk tunes. Everyone who can strum an acoustic guitar gets a shot in this movie. (Who the heck is John Buck Wilkin?) The editing is rough too. "The American Dreamer" is essential viewing for Dennis Hopper fans, but a failure by most general criteria. Rated 2.5/5 Stars •  Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 03/31/23 Full Review Read all reviews

The American Dreamer

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