Review of Kill Your Darlings (2013) by Jose Q — 03 Mar 2014

A decent film that could have been better, Kill Your Darlings is another cinematic portrait of a select few artists at the center of the Beat Generation that exclusively focuses upon an early event in their tight knit and slightly pretentious social circle that threatened to tear their inner core apart.

Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe stars as bespectacled poet Allen Ginsberg in his first year at Columbia where he befriends the daringly grandiose Lucien Carr (Dane DeHaan - The Place Beyond the Pines) who is basically being stalked by a much older amorous admirer (Michael C.

Hall - 'Dexter') who has followed him from city to city in hopes of winning the aloof yet flirtatious cipher's affection. Jack Kerouac (Jack Huston - 'Boardwalk Empire'), Edie Parker (Elizabeth Olson - Martha Marcy May Marlene) and William S.

Burroughs (Ben Foster - Lone Survivor) are other Beat members associated with Ginsberg, Carr and the besotted and ill-fated David Kammerer (Hall) who factor into this unfortunate story. The film has a nice look to it but it falters a time or two when it tries to convey the manic-ness of drugs and in ultimately figuring out the focus of the story this movie wants to tell.

Towards the end, it becomes rather unfocused and it isn't overly clear who the movie is actually about as some of the central figures fall by the wayside with little fanfare or explanation. The cast is strong, the set/art direction is swell and the costumes all appear authentic.

As strong as elements of this film are, bits of it feel weak ... much like the artists at the center of the story -- they didn't all measure up.