'Gonzo Girl' Review: A Drug-Fuelled Explosion of Toxic Masculinity and Wannabe Relevance [TIFF 2023]
willem dafoe becomes walker reade, an erratic, unpredictable, drug-fuelled personality, and the viewer joins camila morrone as she delves into this chaotic world.
This year’s Toronto International Film Festival featured several films directed by actors we know and love, including Ethan Hawke’s Wildcat, Chris Pine’s Poolman, Viggo Mortensen’s The Dead Don’t Hurt, Anna Kendrick’s Woman of the Hour, and of course, Patricia Arquette’s wild and electric Gonzo Girl. For some, this is just another project added to their extensive filmography, but for others, this is their directorial debut – their first attempt at making a name for themselves behind the camera.
Based off the book of the same name by Cheryl Della Pietra, this film tracks weeks in the life of writer-in-the-making Alley Russo (played by Camila Morrone) as she works as an assistant for washed up author Walker Reade (Willem Dafoe). The characters are fictional, but inspired by Pietra’s chaotic experience as the assistant of Hunter S. Thompson, American author and founder of gonzo journalism. For those unfamiliar, gonzo journalism is stylistic, defined as an author placing themselves in the middle of the written world. It is often extremely personal and subjective, and can, and often does, include exaggerations, critiques, and satirical elements, shocking the reader (and in this case, the viewer).
This is a wild film from start to finish, a whirlwind of drugs and fighting and drugs and furiously writing and taking more drugs. Alley moves to a remote location to live with infamous Walker Reade and his ever-rotating band of revellers to help him finish a much-needed book (needed by publishers for money, of course). Reade once had an established career, where he would take on political and social issues, formulate radical ideas, and spin them into narratives for the masses. At the beginning of the film, it is evident that Reade has fallen on harder times and spends most of his time burning through money and various forms of illicit substances, instead of typing up his latest ideas. Alley is promised $25,000 in return for a draft of a new book, and what begins as excitement and slight apprehension swiftly turns into frustration and a loss of self as she delves into Reade and his world of anarchy.
Naturally, Dafoe is stellar in the unstable shoes of Walker Reade, reeling between different emotions at unnatural speeds. He’s entirely convincing as this out-of-this-world character, and has great comedic timing. While, technically, Morrone’s Alley is the main character, she takes a back seat to Dafoe’s supporting role, but this dynamic works with the story, possibly pushing some of the overarching themes even more.
The cast is great, with Elizabeth Lail, Ray Nicholson, and Sean Penn working together to create the community that lives with and off of Walker. While it can be a little iffy when a famous actor takes a stab at directing and casts themselves, Arquette gives herself a smaller role that works perfectly, playing Claudia, a loyal half-friend half-employee of Walker.
The film discusses toxic masculinity in a unique setting, focusing on being a woman in a man’s world, both generally, at a societal level, and specifically, living in the house of a man high on reputation. Not only does Alley’s time belong to her “employer”, but also her personal life, her sexuality, her private behaviours. While she is there to make a name for herself and gain inspiration for her own career, she falls into the inevitable trap of being sexualized and seen as her gender, first and foremost. Some scenes are especially hard to watch, and the screen radiates unfairness, burning even hotter because of the acceptance and promotion even by fellow women in the house.
Gonzo Girl explores the erratic lifestyle that can accompany being a self-proclaimed artist, with Dafoe heralding this through a performance of all highs and lows and in-betweens. Morrone is a new talent, beginning her career as a model and only appearing in films and television series beginning in 2018, yet she holds her own, and gives a solid, naturalistic performance as this unique character.
Despite being thematically strong, a lack of a solid plot ends up creating an echo chamber, with themes reiterated over and over again, with, of course, a side of drugs. It’s a creative and interesting film, but does begin to run out of steam, and may have fared better with some tighter editing and a slightly reduced runtime. This is a solid directorial debut from Patricia Arquette, and viewers may want to keep an eye out for anything new she creates.