The Rum Diary Reviews

While I am a huge fan of hunter s thompson and the book, I was very excited for the movie. I very much appreciate johnny depp taking the time and money to put this film together. I really feel a little disappointed by the film, I'd still rate it a weak b- but feel hunters writing is not as well portrayed like it was in fear and loathing. While johnny depp and giovani ribisi really carry the movie and both give stellar performances I was let down by the film ability to captivate the story. Worth checking out when it comes to dvd!

Honestly, I wasn’t sure what to expect from this flick. I mean, even though I definitely enjoyed ‘Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas’, I always had some mixed feelings about this movie. Furthermore, even though Johnny Depp is right now the most popular actor from Hollywood, I didn’t like much his recent work and is slowly but surely becoming one of the most overrated actors at work nowadays. Anyway, eventually, I thought this movie was rather disappointing. I mean, it was not bad at all but I could have been so much better than this. Above all, I thought the tone was just wrong. Indeed, even though we are supposed to be dealing with some major alcoholists, I thought that the whole thing was terribly sober. Of course, it shouldn’t be too similar to ‘ Fear and Loathing…’ but there should have been a little more mayhem and it should have been a more messy. It is like the directing, it was rather decent with some nice shots and an interesting use of colors but that was exactly the problem. The whole thing looked just way too neat and clean. Furthermore, except for Kemp , none of the other characters were properly developed, they remained really sketchy and you never got the change to know them a little bit. Concerning Kemp, I must admit that Johnny Depp gave a solid performance but, still, I wasn’t really sure what to make of his character. Was he a loser alcoholic ? A great idealistic writer ? A wasted half crazy talent? At the end, you have a text explaining that he got back to New York, married the girl and became a famous writer… While watching this, I thought ‘ You gotta to be kidding me…’. It was really unbelievable… Eventually, I never felt much excitement about Kemp’ s adventures in Puerto Rico and I honestly never felt that he himself was having a good time either. To conclude, I think there was there somewhere a pretty good flick but the end-result was rather disappointing. Still, if you are fan of Johnny Depp, I still believe it is worth a look though.

Never truly anything great, and Depp is clearly too old for the role, but there’s something so oddly charming and entertaining about The Rum Diary. Maybe it’s that there’s clearly a lot of love for Hunter S. Thompson on display here, and the film works best when you think of it as a love-letter to the days when the artist was trying to find his footing and artistic voice. By the time the film ends the true story and legacy has begun, and everything that happens here is just an unfocused, loosely connected string of vignettes that are amiable but offer no true insight into his character, writing, or importance.

The booze-filled meandering zig-zags between amusing adventures of Depp and his cohorts at an English-language newspaper in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and the far more interesting, but very predictable, origins of Thompson’s alter-ego raging against moneyed interests and predatory upper-classes. A romantic subplot is severely undercooked and incredibly obvious, but Amber Heard’s mermaid-like rise from the water is positively romantic and erotic at the same moment, a rare moment in which we can witness a goddess emerging from nature.

A fun entertainment that wanders around with it’s heart-on-its-sleeve paying tribute to Thompson’s legacy, but revealing nothing new about the man behind it. That may sound like faint praise, and maybe it is. But this is just a cocktease of what kind of outlandish, feverish, delirious gonzo-literature that Thompson would go on to create and perfect over his lifetime.

Any film featuring Johnny Depp on-screen is going to bring great excitement to critics, film fanatics and amongst others which generally leads to exceedingly high expectations. Plus, in The Rum Diary there were other possibilities that could make it become something worthwhile to fully enjoy and get a lot of fun out of due to the settings of the film, cinematography and with a story that could have been a good laugh and to get a lot of enjoyment from. However, after watching it, it’s as plain and dry as a plank of wood, but it wasn’t entirely awful to watch.


In all honesty, you need to be in the right frame of mind to go into this and understand it for what it is, but the aspects within the film feature comedy, drama and romance. It perhaps isn’t classed as a comedy, but of what we witnessed in the trailer there was bound to be something humourous about it, but it was not even funny in the slightest. In every film, there has to be at least a little emotion but in the case of The Rum Diary, there was almost nothing exciting, ground-breaking or thought-provoking at all about it, so it really lacked a heart and soul with a solid ending featuring a meaningful message.


Johnny Depp in a leading role is always exciting to see, but from a personal perspective, The Rum Diary just wasn’t for him for a variety of reasons. Kemp is a middle-aged man who is stuck in between his destiny and his destruction, and what this film is about is to discover what is most important of the two and what must be done to achieve it. Quite frankly, where this character flops is that we aren’t entirely sure whether Kemp is deep down a low-life or somebody who takes life seriously. Plus, whether he is quite a dangerous individual as well regarding his constant lust to drink despite being cautioned beforehand. Speaking of which, Depp drinking rum, where have we seen that before? Perhaps in a series of films where he bought forth a character and performance that has made him the iconic Hollywood actor that he is, so on a positive side it was good to see Depp acting in that familiar style of acting underneath a new character and style of film. Despite that one positive concept of his role, it is definitely Depp’s weakest performance in quite a long time.


After his breakthrough yet underrated role as Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight, Aaron Eckhart makes a supporting appearance as local businessman Sanderson, who is the friend then soon-to-be nemesis of Kemp due to their mutual love for Chenault. Only by looking at Eckhart in this film, all you can see is Harvey Dent and because Sanderson is a rather plain and a character who we have seen countless times in many films over the years, his character simply did not work either. Amber Heard seriously is very easy on the eyes but not all that easy on the ears as she portrays Sanderson’s girlfriend and Kemp’s love interest, Chenault. There’s just a conflicted love triangle between them that doesn’t really leave you with anything in the end, and is just felt totally abandoned. There were no sparks or romantic chemistry between Chenault and neither Sanderson nor Kemp. Michael Rispoli was definitely the best actor from the film and gives a good performance as Sala, who is a drunken alcoholic who is well-intentioned deep down but always runs into trouble and all hell breaks loose with him. Rispoli portrays a scruffy alcoholic impressively, and as a result, deserves a thumbs-up for his role.


Bruce Robinson, who is perhaps only best known as the director and screenwriter of Withnail & I and the screenwriter of The Killing Fields in 1984, returns to direct only his fourth feature film in his entire career. Although, there isn’t much to experience from him due to the short filmography, he could’ve returned after 19 years and given us a film that could have become an Oscar contender, but it wasn’t to be. As for the screenplay, it could have been a lot better than it turned out and it was filled with clichéd and cheesy lines. Robinson could become a good film director if he improvises and goes on to make better films than this one in the future.


Overall, The Rum Diary is a rather flat and empty film that is almost heartless with no meaning or message and no chemistry between the characters, and for this reason, it is perhaps the most disappointing film of 2011 thus far. If you have read the novels of the late Hunter S. Thompson, you might be able to gain an understanding of the story (like Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas which also starred Johnny Depp), but personally if you’ve read the book but not seen the film, you might be disappointed. Just like the film as a whole, it could’ve been something really interesting with emotion, romance and comedy but I think due to the lack of performance from the actors, it failed.

Paul Kemp is an American journalist who is struggling to find his voice. When he takes a job in beautiful sunny Puerto Rico he hopes that his life will turn around. He finds himself drinking heavily, writing horoscopes and trying to build himself a life. It all turns around when he meets Hal Sanderson and his beautiful girlfriend Chenault with whom he feels an instant connection. Paul struggles to maintain his professional and social life, all the while trying to find his own voice.

A well written, well balanced story based on the novel by Hunter S. Thompson. Thompson applied for a job at the real San Juan Star, just like the one portrayed in the movie. He made friends with the writers on staff and then wrote the novel based around them. This provided good source material for a film that deals a lot with substance abuse. Paul Kemp is an alcoholic who is denial, and finds himself dealing with the struggles of maintaining a normal life. The 60s atmosphere is captured; the unabashed lifestyle is well defined by the public drinking the inherent ability to light up a cigarette anywhere they chose. The lifestyle is much different then the modern era, but it very much came alive through the eccentricity of the characters.

Lead by the talented Johnny Depp, the cast does a marvellous job of giving breath to an era that has been over done in films. Ms.Heard is very sensual in her portrayal of Chenault, a natural beauty who catches the eye of every man as she enters the bar. Chenault catches the eye of a charismatic Paul Kemp, but their relationship is forbidden as she is dating Hal Sanderson. A tension builds between Kemp and Chenault, an undeniable connection is immediately established and it built through out the film.

The cast may have been the central factor in driving the feel of the era, but another big factor played an important role. The source material as touched on before is a unique style created by Thompson himself. Many of the works of fiction directly mirror the career of Thompson, of course the trouble and the absurdities Paul and his friends find themselves a part of may have been a bit over dramatized or over exaggerated, but the material and the realism was already there. This movie was based on a novel that was based on a real world situation; therefore the ground work for a successful film was already laid out.

With the sun soaked atmosphere of Puerto Rico at the ready, The Rum Diary takes a step beyond just being a dramatic story. There are scenes of crude behaviour and excessive drinking and drug use. This as well and every other work by Thompson is targeted at a very specific audience, therefore this film is definitely not for everyone. The excessive drinking and drug use is no stranger in films based on works by Hunter S. Thompson. The alcohol and drug use in this film is mild in comparison to Fear and Loathing, but it still has the willingness to show it.

The way the Rum Diaries is built is the exact foundation necessary to make a film that is adored by its audience. It is broken down into three acts: The introduction, Paul Kemp is first introduced to the island. The second act, his rise among the ranks of local well known men. And the third act, when his lifestyle and choices have real world consequences and he is forced to decide what is next.

The Rum Diary is a well done flick, the essentials are all present. Mr. Depp has successfully portrayed another work of Thompson with ease and efficiency. This cast was superb, The Rum Dairy is very enjoyable as a film. Have your own discretion when deciding whether or not to see, but I say it is well worth a viewing.