VAL KILMER PLAYS JIM MORRISON IN OLIVER STONE'S 'THE DOORS'

Val Kilmer in Oliver Stone's THE DOORS Year: 1991 Rating: ***

At one point in Oliver Stone's THE DOORS, Jim Morrison is told by one of several female admirers that he's better than the band itself, and that everyone only cares about him... that HE ALONE is The Doors... which is basically how Stone's movie winds up, far too quickly shifting away from an involving biopic about how four guys met in Venice, California and started a band, wrote great songs and played (from nightclubs to auditoriums) before screaming audiences...

So the first act harbors the best scenes, with Kilmer's brooding Morrison meeting founding member keyboardist Kyle MacLachlan as Ray Manzerek, a kind of uptight Felix to Jim's grungy Oscar... as Stone's PLATOON tough-guy Kevin Dillon plays drummer John Densmore as the band's Doubting Thomas, while Jim's real life favorite Robby Krieger's portrayed by Frank Whaley like he's never taken a single drug in his life...

Val Kilmer with Meg Ryan and his KILL ME AGAIN co-star Michael Madsen in THE DOORS

In actuality, Krieger, who wrote a lion share of the band's music to Jim's poetry/lyrics, was a Flamenco guitarist living off a vanload of marijuana, and could play anything on the guitar, yet Whaley handles the instrument like he's just learned how... an otherwise easy task for MacLachlan, who, able to hide his fingers behind the Hammond organ, spends the latter part of the movie lecturing Morrison like a conservative father in a 1980's anti-drug Afterschool Special...

Anyone who's listened to the band on acid will know, they're all in on the psychedelic act... but Stone decided to turn a rock band's combined journey into success more about the lead singer's singular excess: that really should have been titled THE LIZARD KING, Morrison's enigmatic nickname, or perhaps JIM AND PAM...

Val Kilmer and Meg Ryan THE DOORS

Or maybe even PAM AND JIM, since the insanely miscast Meg Ryan, as Jim's girlfriend Pam Courson, has almost equal screentime, whining incessantly like from the kind of neurotic romantic-comedy that made her a star... while the brightest light is the lead performance by method-actor Val Kilmer himself...

Effectively nailing the icon's speaking/singing voice (although it's doubtful that song lyrics would be strewn throughout actual conversations), his deliberately overboard portrayal of Morrison is spontaneous and intriguing, and, although ultimately more antagonistic than the kind of vulnerable pawn he probably was, Val ultimately turns Jim into a love-to-hate villain, recklessly clashing against the passive hippie counter-culture (except for a few bad-influence cronies, seeming like a rowdy poolhall gang in an episodic crime series)...

Val Kilmer in Oliver Stone's THE DOORS

In that, Kilmer effectively portrays a borderline possessed psychopath who seems to controversially crash instead of artistically performing live concerts after what feels like reluctantly creating music in the studio...

But had Stone/Kilmer's characterization been realistic, Jim Morrison wouldn't have been able to record a single single, much less six entire albums (with non-linear songs as an ongoing thematic-soundtrack surrogate) that the true legacy of THE DOORS is forever based.

Val Kilmer, Frank Whaley and Kevin Dillon in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer, Frank Whaley, Kyle MacLachlan and Kevin Dillon in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer as Jim Morrsion in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer as Jim Morrsion in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer and Frank Whaley in THE DOORS

Sam Whipple in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer as Jim Morrsion in THE DOORS

Frank Whaley in THE DOORS

From Oliver Stone's THE DOORS

Friend and Cult Actress Olivia Barash crooning in THE DOORS

Crispin Glover as Andy Warhol in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer and Kathleen Quinlan in THE DOORS

Val Kilmer in THE DOORS

My High School Acid-Dropping crony Rich Dutchak stands left of Kevin Dillon in THE DOORS

Old buddy Rich Dutchak claps Kevin Dillon, Frank Whaley and Val Kilmer in THE DOORS