Better In Your Head?--LEAVING LAS VEGAS

 

Spoiler Alert: SoCo or GTFO!

THE BOOK-Written by John O'Brien, released 1990

THE MOVIE-Directed & written by Mike Figgis, released 1995

THE STORY-Ben Sanderson has gone from "yes-man" to "no-hoper." He lacks a future...but not a purpose. He is going to drink himself into the Great Who-Knows.

MIND THE GAP-John O'Brien died in April 1994 of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, mere weeks after signing away the film rights of Leaving Las Vegas. He'd struggled with alcohol throughout adulthood, "a tireless architect of his undoing"--and a sensitive chronicler of it also. While the events of LLV should not be misunderstood as strictly autobiographical, the mood is a dire reflection of a broken man. (Members of O'Brien's family described the novel as his "suicide note.")

Nicolas Cage weaved and wobbled his way to a Best Actor Oscar, but I regard his portrayal of a fatalistic boozer as quite overrated. Book Ben engaged the senses: I saw the pallor, smelled the poisonous potables, tasted the plaster, heard the pushes/pulls/pings/pops. Film Ben couldn't die fast enough for my satisfaction. Elisabeth Shue is fine as Sera, the whore with the iron heart. Again, not a sniff on O'Brien's version.

Sympathy for the devil relies heavily on a person's stance vis-à-vis free will. If alcoholism is a disease, and if women are taught (however covertly) that their greatest value is as a sexual object, how aren't Ben and Sera worthy of compassion, forgiveness, and love?

By putting her worst moment in the first act, O'Brien shows Sera's formidable inner strength. For her to endure such a horror and still love a self-loathing man is just barely more than touching than exasperating. The movie puts this scene near the end, and Sera comes off as a ungrateful slut receiving due punishment. 

I guess Ben and Sera consummating their relationship was meant to evoke bittersweet feelings. Necrophilia, more like.

BETTER IN YOUR HEAD-Whatever the novel's flaws (mainly, punchy sentences when just a slap would've sufficed) it is a brilliant presentation of brutal people who desire despite distrust, no apologies given or taken. O'Brien's world is bleak, authentic, and never stale. 

Wisely, action alternates between Ben's and Sera's perspectives, and it is Sera who sees us out. "She can, and will, do this forever," the text claims, and her resilience has stuck with me more than Ben's sour-breathed submissiveness. 

Okay, so...most interesting character diminished, overwrought primary performance, 90s jazz soundtrack baffling slo-mo shots and superfluous freeze frames. One of the easiest decisions yet!