Franco Amurri-Flashback (1990)

Dennis Hopper is an ageing Yippie who is a dead ringer for Abbie Hoffman. He has been on the run from the FBI for 20 years for a prank against Spiro Agnew that he did not commit. Kiefer Sutherland is the FBI agent who is supposed to transport him from San Francisco to Spokane for trial after he is finally caught. What at first seems like a simple, linear plot starts to take unexpected u-turn after u-turn, which is what finally makes this film work. The two never make it to Spokane. It turns out that Sutherland is himself the child of hippie parents who ran away from home; Hopper is trying to get a book published and needs the publicity generated by his arrest to interest a publisher. Giving away too much more of the film will ruin the surprise value that the plot twists have, so go see this for yourself. This may be one of those rare examples of a film in which plot drift not only doesn't ruin the film, but makes it better. Apart from a few lame jokes early in the film, the humor here is also quite good.

This is the milestone movie that made me admire Dennis Hopper's versatile, but also accurate, style of acting.
I feel he portrays a certain level of comfortable spontaneity and peaceful individuality. It doesn't matter if the character Huey Walker was real or not or if the situation he was in actually happened, the story was entertaining and it had a great plot.
This movie almost had me in tears the first time I watched it, and it made me feel like I just wanted to be myself. It made me feel like I was important, no matter what my name was or what I looked like, or where I came from. And even if I try to hide who I am, I know who I am. It made me feel like the only true way for me to be free, is to be comfortable with myself. That's what I got from the movie (Eric Clapton - Interview with Robert Dimery, London, 1991)


no pass