Amazon.com video review:
Gus Van Sant's often-beautiful 1991 film stars River Phoenix
as a narcoleptic, Seattle male prostitute and Keanu Reeves as the rich
friend who agrees to help him find his mother. After a solid hour or
so of the two traveling on this quest through Idaho and Italy, Van
Sant throws a wrench into the works by conjuring a gay version of
Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part I, with Reeves's character as
Prince Hal and filmmaker William Richert (who directed Phoenix in the
1988 Night in the Life
of Jimmy Reardon) as a variation on Falstaff. The experiment
is interesting to watch, but you can't help wondering what on earth
happened to the movie. Still, the film has a cult status one can't
argue with, and Phoenix gives a tragic performance that stays in the
memory. --Tom Keogh
