Drugstore Cowboy

March 25 · Regal Riviera · 5:15 P.M.

Gus Van Sant, 1989, 104 minutes

“No previous drug-themed film has the honesty or originality of Gus Van Sant’s drama Drugstore Cowboy.” — Variety

“Van Sant’s treatment of drugs is refreshingly free of either moralizing or romanticizing. It’s one indication of his ease and assurance that he successfully integrates the persona of William S. Burroughs into a fiction film.” — Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader

1989 was a watershed year in independent film: Spike Lee made the transition from indies to studio pictures with Do The Right Thing. A 26 year-old commercial director from Baton Rouge named Steven Soderbergh became the youngest winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes with his debut feature, sex, lies, and videotape. And Portland-based filmmaker Gus Van Sant wrote and directed Drugstore Cowboy, which was named Best Picture by the National Society of Film Critics.

Van Sant’s second feature was a considerable step up in budget from his debut, Mala Noche, which was shot on 16mm for $20,000. But like Mala Noche, Van Sant filmed in and around his Portland home and trained his lens on a group of people living in society’s margins. Drugstore Cowboy tells the story of a group of addicts who support their habit by knocking off pharmacies around the pacific northwest. Bob (Matt Dillon) and Nadine (Kelly Lynch), the superstitious leaders of the gang, steer them into and out of trouble.

Dillon’s remarkable performance centers the movie, but Lynch, James LeGros, and a young Heather Graham are equally compelling as the motley crew. William S. Burroughs turns up late in the film as Tom, an elderly, drug-addicted priest. Though his scenes were filmed in only one day, Burroughs’ presence isn’t mere “stunt casting.” He brings a gravitas to the role that few others could.

Van Sant’s uncommon compassion for his characters, his refusal to judge their desires and decisions, has been a hallmark of his work, from Mala Noche (1985), through his Oscar-winning Good Will Hunting (1997), to his Cobain-inspired tone poem Last Days (2005). The Portland that served as backdrop to Drugstore Cowboy has remained a continued source of inspiration for Van Sant, serving as the backdrop to no less than eight of his seventeen features.