Wonderland (2003)
Based on the actual murders that took place on Wonderland Avenue, Laurel Canyon, LA, which centers on Val Kilmer as adult star John Holmes who was involved in four gruesome killings in 1981.
Not the cock grabbing sleazy sex fest you might expect when you think of Holmes aka Johnny Wadd, out of the porn industry and basically living in his car with his under age girlfriend (Kate Bosworth). Instead this is a multi-angle look at the murders from the viewpoints of Holmes, and biker and dealer turned police informant David Lind (Dylan McDermott) which tells the fractured story of what happened when a robbery of organised crime figure Eddie Nash (Eric Bogosian) went badly wrong with Nash' retaliation brutal and deadly.
Basically this takes up where Boogie Nights (1997) finishes in the story of John Holmes, his adult movie career now over. It's sordid and violent and pretty gloomy to look at for sunny Los Angeles, with the story running non-linear being told in fractured flashbacks and drug hazed patchwork recollections, but Kilmer plays Holmes deteriorating personality rather well as do the rest of a pretty star studded cast (Josh Lucas, Christina Applegate, Lisa Kudrow, Tim Blake Nelson, Carrie Fisher, Janeane Garofalo, Natasha Gregson Wagner, Ted Levine, Paris Hilton) in their mainly decidedly grotty outcast roles.
I like Wonderland, it's a subversive slice of film making that goes to show what happened in Laurel Canyon during the halcyon days of the sixties, seventies and eighties wasn't all rock n' roll hedonism.
The film does feature an excellent soundtrack from the era including T-Rex, ZZ Top, Bad Company, Terry Reid, Patti Smith, Joan Jett, Funkadelic and Duran Duran among aothers.
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