Kill Your Darlings (2014) – Film starring Daniel Radcliffe and Dane DeHaan

★★★☆☆

5 word summary:

Another pretentious Beat poet film.

5 sentence review:

This film tells about Allen Ginsberg’s first years in university, and his encountering the soon-to-be murderer Lucien Carr. Carr and Ginsberg’s relationship becomes strained by Carr’s older lover. We see how Ginsberg struggles with his admiration of Carr while other characters and circumstances get in his way.

I can’t say that I am a fan of the genre of film (such as On The Road) which just present the way these guys lives and worked as mesmerising, which I’m sure it was, because these men are incredibly talented and interesting, but not for a modern cinema audience, because unfortunately we need more than just well read poetry to draw our attention now-a-days.

Another thing I dislike about this type of film is that it is ‘based’ on real events but this begs the question…how much of this is true and how much is just artist licence? Coming from this film I think I know more about Kerouac and Ginsberg and this is now all that I really know about Lucien Carr and this seems slightly unfair to their memories because a lot of this is probably not true, even if the barebones of the story is.

The assembled cast was good, Dane DeHaan is phenomenal (I’m very excited to see him in a big-budget film like Spiderman) although I would like to see him doing a role that isn’t essentially evil, and even Daniel Radcliffe wasn’t as bad as he is in everything else.

The film looked good, Radcliffe’s glasses and hair were a particular highlight, and the way it was filmed drew you into the actors, which makes sense because this is a biopic, you could enjoy their performances without being too distracted with the 1940s regalia (this could be because they couldn’t afford to fill a scene with authentic 1940 scenery).

5 good things:

1. The acting standard was generally high.

2. Costuming.

3. How pretty but gritty the 1940s looked.

4. If you are a Harry/Malfoy shipper then Radcliffe has a slightly graphic sex scene with a blond gentleman.

5. I finally saw a film with Elizabeth Olsen in (although she wasn’t in a lot of it).

5 bad things:

1. How many times Dane DeHaan hanged himself.

2. Not knowing how true anything is.

3. The fact you don’t meet people this passionate in university.

4. The odd scene where Ginsberg is on drugs but thinks he has stopped time in a bar (not sure if I explained that well).

5. Michael C. Hall wasn’t very effective.