Movies - The Doors

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The Doors is a 1991 film about Jim Morrison and The Doors. It was directed by Oliver Stone, and stars Val Kilmer as Morrison, Meg Ryan as Pamela Courson (Morrison's companion), Kevin Dillon as John Densmore, Kyle MacLachlan as Ray Manzarek, Frank Whaley as Robby Krieger and Kathleen Quinlan as Patricia Kennealy.

Kilmer was reportedly Stone's second choice for the role, the first being British rock singer Ian Astbury, who in fact went on to join the reformed Doors. Kyle MacLachlan, a longtime Doors fan, was quoted as saying that he had wanted to portray Morrison himself and firmly believed that he could play the part, but settled for the role of Manzarek after Kilmer was selected.

The film is very much focused on Morrison, portraying him as larger-than-life and an icon of 1960s rock and roll, counterculture, and the drug-using free love hippie lifestyle. But the depiction goes beyond the iconic: his alcoholism, interest in the spiritual plane and hallucinogenic drugs as entheogens, and, particularly, his obsession with death are threads which weave in and out of the film. Attentive viewers (or those who listen to Stone's DVD commentary) witness Death personified throughout the film by Richard Rutowski, who even appears in drag in one scene. The film's tagline is The Ultimate Story of Drugs, Sex and Rock 'N' Roll.

The film's soundtrack contains over two dozen of The Doors' songs; in the film, original recordings of the band are seamlessly combined with convincing vocal performances by Kilmer himself. So eerily accurate was Kilmer's portrayal of Morrison, that even the remaining band members sometimes found it difficult to distinguish between his vocal renditions and Morrison's original recordings.

Dramatization, not biography

The film is based mostly on real people and actual events, but is clearly Stone's vision and dramatization of those people and events. For example, when Morrison is asked to change the infamous lyric in Light My Fire for his appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show, he is depicted as blatantly ignoring their request because of his rebellious, anti-authority principles. In truth, the real Morrison insisted that it was an accident, that he meant to change the lyric but was so nervous about performing on live television that he forgot to change it when he was singing. One questionable scene featured Morrison and Courson getting into such a nasty argument that he tries to jump out the window and then throws the frightened, apologetic Courson on the bed and performs what looks like a near act of rape against her. Drummer John Densmore is also questionably portrayed as hating Morrison as Morrison's personal and drug problems begin to dominate his behavior.

Krieger, Densmore, and Kennealy are all credited as technical advisors for the film, and the settings for the film, particularly the concert sequences, are depicted realistically and in mostly chronological order. At the same time, the surviving Doors members were said to be unhappy with the final product, heavily criticizing Stone's portrayal of Morrison as an out of control sociopath, and disowned it.

But as the credits point out and as Stone emphasizes on his DVD commentary, some characters, names, and incidents in the film are fictitious or amalgamations of real people. Stone points out in the 1997 documentary The Road of Excess that Quinlan's character is in particular, a composite and, in retrospect, should have been given a fictitious name. Ryan's character involves liberties of a different sort: Courson's parents had inherited Morrison's poems when their daughter died, and Stone had to agree to restrictions about his portrayal of her in exchange for the rights to use the poetry.

Plot summary

The film starts Jim Morrison's life with a childhood memory where Morrison sees an elderly Indian dying by the roadside (in referance to the line "Indians scattered on dawn's highway bleeding, Ghosts crowd the young child's fragile eggshell mind" from the band's famous song, "Peace Frog"). The film picks up with Morrison's arrival in California and his assimilation into the Venice Beach culture, followed by his film school days at UCLA; his introduction to his girlfriend Pamela Courson; his first encounters with Ray Manzarek; and the origin of The Doors — made up of Manzarek, Robby Krieger, and John Densmore.

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Movies - The Doors

Dramatization, not biography

Plot summary

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