The Beach Bum

El Biffo

Puzzling why anyone would make a film that deliberately ensures that no one would sympathize with the main character at all (I'm not going to dismiss the brutal attack of a disabled person for drinking money as "free-spirited"), making the remaining 75 minutes a struggle to sit through, as this person is celebrated for their hedonism. I came for the cinematography of Benoit Debie. See it in a theater or not at all.

Matthew Martens

A zen-nihilist black hole haloed by a lurid sunset corona. I continue to prefer this latter-day, curdle-mellowed Korine to the more aggressively toxic kid of fast-receding yore, mostly because, for now at least, his sadness trumps disgust. It may be that Moondog (name taken, dammit), a ready-made McConaughey masterwork, is what Richard Brautigan would have become, instead of a suicide, if only he'd been a sociopath.

MATTEO BITTANTI

Harmony Korine's masturbatory fantasies: introducing Fear and Loathing in Miami. Or, rather, GTA: Vice City starring Forrest Gump with phalluses, guns, and drugs. Korine co-opts the counterculture, repackaging it as a tame, unconvincing critique of capitalism (burn-baby-burn) to eulogize the white male asshole-genius who can do anything he wants because, well, he's a white male asshole-genius. Mar-a-lago, the movie.

Ghostman

Korine's warmest film, both literally & figuratively. Along with Mister Lonely, it's his most personal work yet. While that film was about what it's like to be a celebrity, this one is about what it's like to be a rich person and, I guess, an artist. It's interesting to me how Korine can have his cake & eat it too. Moondog is a shit but he's also a nice guy who knows how to have some fun. The ending is a curious one.

Ethan

This is a beautiful display of cosmic debauchery and chill times, all the while dealing with the shittiness of life with a stoned grin and a peaceful state of mind. McConaughey is nothing short of brilliant in this film and sometimes feels like this is what he would be like if he was a poet. The supporting cast is brilliant as well as this stoned hero navigates through this assortment of quirky stoned characters.

Jason

M. McConaughey and H. Korine both come on w/ a swagger you might call Chaplinesque, and surely a beach bum ain't far off from a tramp. One might also invoke Captain Beefheart's "Dropout Boogie" and 92 IN THE SHADE. The hilarity of THE BEACH BUM is already there in the resources at Korine's disposal, and all the excesses we can conceive--we celebrate them even when we repudiate them--relate to conspicuous consumption.

Steve Pulaski

"The Beach Bum" is an experience that ever-so-beautifully compliments its lead character. Matthew McConaughey sinks into the role of a free-spirit, free of accountability and socialization, living unchained in a chaotic world. Harmony Korine enlists in an ensemble that fully embraces this, and from Snoop Dogg to Jimmy Buffett, we get a delightful bunch of loons. So lucid, so beautiful, and so elusive all the more.

Filipe F. Coutinho

If there were any doubts that Matthew McConaughey was born to play a free-wheeling, thrill-seeker, drug-fueled Floridian named Moondog, those doubts are crushed in the first ten minutes of Harmony Korine’s The Beach Bum. The remaining ninety are not much different. Even when the narrative takes a dark turn, or the stakes are raised, there’s a thick layer of c’est la vie coating the sun drenched Keys. (cont'd below)