Less Than Zero (film)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Less than Zero | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Directed by | Marek Kanievska |
| Produced by | Jon Avnet, Jordan Kerner, Marvin Worth |
| Written by | Harley Payton (screenplay), Bret Easton Ellis (novel) |
| Starring | Andrew McCarthy, Jami Gertz, Robert Downey Jr., James Spader |
| Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
| Release date(s) | November 6, 1987 |
| Running time | 98 min. |
| Language | English |
| IMDb profile | |
Less Than Zero is a 1987 film based on the novel of the same name by Bret Easton Ellis. It stars Andrew McCarthy, Jami Gertz, Robert Downey Jr., and James Spader. It has been rated R by the MPAA.
Contents |
[edit] Plot
Clay (McCarthy) is a college freshman who returns home to Los Angeles, California, for Christmas, and finds things to be a bit of a mess. His ex-girlfriend Blair (Gertz) has been having sex with his high school friend, the drug-addicted Julian (Downey), who is being hassled by his dealer, Rip (Spader), for the $50,000 he owes. What follows is Clay's effort to help clean up Julian. The movie presents a look at the culture of wealthy youth in Los Angeles and has a strong anti-drug message, something that never existed in the novel.
[edit] Departures from the Book
The movie focused on a strong anti-drug message, rather than the emptiness of the characters' lives as displayed in the novel.
Also, in the book, Clay must decide whether he wants to continue his relationship with Blair, while in the movie they have already broken up and Blair is now involved with Julian. Clay seems to have given-up on both of them after seeing Blair after she called him while he was back east. It is after the scene when Clay is swimming does Clay appear to have decided to re-involve himself with Blair and Julian, while in the book he seems uncertain he wants to continue with her the whole time, even saying at one point that he never loved Blair. Also, in the film, Clay is determined to clean up Julian's drug abuse and debts, but in the book Julian's behavior only seems to disillusion Clay with the people in Los Angeles even more. In addition, many of the characters in the movie never existed in the book.
Other minor changes include: Clay and Julian are not blonde and tan like they were in the novel. Rip is Julian's dealer in the movie, when in the book Rip was Clay's dealer (Clay was a frequent drug user in the book) and Julian is a dealer himself but is also indebted to a dealer named Finn; and Clay's friend Trent, who was a major character in the novel, has a greatly reduced role in the movie.
Many important plot-bearing scenes from the book were also removed in the translation to film. These removals are arguably the most obvious strays from Easton Ellis' novel. Of these are: a very profound scene describing in great detail (to show the importance, contrary to the rest of the novel's loose details), Clay and Blair running over a coyote and Clay seeing it die; a scene where Clay and friends see a dead body in an alley, which helped show how exposed to the world the teenagers were at such a young age; and the famous final scene where a 12 year old girl is tied to a bed and raped in Rip's apartment.
[edit] Reception
Upon its release, Ellis was supposedly so embarrassed with the adaptation that he refused to go to the premiere. However, as time went on Ellis seemed to have had a change of heart, and said in an interview on Amazon.com [1] in 2005 that while he still disagreed with the script and some of the cast, he said that it was a "beautiful-looking film" and that he knew "of no other movie that caught that period in L.A. so well." He also thought that if the independent film scene had been around in the 1980s, it would've been more faithful to the book, and that the movie "was diluted because it was made by a big studio."
The film has had mixed reviews among critics, Many of whom called it "all style and no substance." Roger Ebert was one of the few major critics to give it a positive review.
[edit] Soundtrack
Produced by Rick Rubin, the original motion picture soundtrack includes songs by Aerosmith, The Count Five, Glenn Danzig & the Power and Fury Orchestra, Joan Jett, Roy Orbison, Poison, Public Enemy ("Bring the Noise"), Run DMC and Slayer. Two singles from the soundtrack reached the Billboard Hot 100: The Bangles with "Hazy Shade of Winter" at No. 2 and LL Cool J's "Going Back to Cali" at No. 31. Thomas Newman's original score, however, remains unavailable (except as heard in the film itself).
