Hunter S. Thompson and The Portrayals of Him in The Movies

            Of course there will never be another Hunter S. Thompson, but Bill Murray and Johnny Depp both do a great job portraying him in their respective movies. Murray plays Thompson in the 1980 movie, ‘Where the Buffalo Roam’, and Depp plays him in the 1998 movie, ‘Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas’. There are many similarities and differences in the way they both portray Thompson, however they both do an equally great job.

            The first one to portray Thompson in the movies was Bill Murray. He played the famous author in the movie ‘Where the Buffalo Roam’. This film follows Thompson and his attorney Mr. Lazlo who in real life was named Oscar Acosta. The movie takes us throughout different events in history which Thompson is covering for a magazine. These include the 1972 Super Bowl and the campaign trail with Nixon. Murray does an excellent job playing Thompson. He really nails him down to the tee based on interviews I have seen of Hunter. He gets perfectly the way he talks, his mannerisms and general attitude. You can definitely tell that Hunter really seeped into Bill and got under his skin in every way.

            The second one to play Thompson in the movies was Johnny Depp in the movie, ‘Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas’. This movie also follows Thompson and his attorney as they make a trip to Vegas to cover the Mint 400 which is a desert race. They end up doing a little more play than work and end up trashing both of there rooms in a drug induced haze. The movie is very well done and it really captures what it was probably like on that trip to Vegas in 1971. Depp does an equally good job playing Hunter, but he portrays him in a very different way. The character Depp plays is Thompson’s alter ego, Raoul Duke. Duke is a crazier, hyped up version of Thompson and Depp nails this crazier side perfectly.

            Murray and Depp do a great job portraying both sides of Thompson. They both really capture the essence and aspects of this great man. They both portray him in a very different way, but that just shows that there are many different sides of Hunter. It would be hard for just one man to completely capture all sides of him, but Depp and Murray do a spectacular job.