Ralph Steadman, long time best friend of Hunter S Thompson is an incredible artist and a genuinely fascinating guy. By that first sentence, it may not come as a surprise that I was extremely excited to see the documentary For No Good Reason, in which actor Johnny Depp reunites with Steadman in order to tell this fantastic artist's story. However, this is one of the most disappointing films that I have seen in quite some time. The problem with the film is that director Charlie Paul is so wrapped up in how interesting this story is that he allows Steadman and Depp to take over the production and essentially just make a film about how awesome they are. It's not that Steadman and Depp are not fascinating, cool guys. In actuality, they seem to be. The problem with this approach is that they too often make sure that the audience knows just how aware they are of that. This is not what an ideal documentary should present. The often pivotal keys to a documentary succeeding are engaging audiences even if they aren't interested in the story and not sugar coating every second of the film. By taking the "look how great the subjects are" approach, this documentary fails at both of those.
The film follows Steadman and Depp's exciting reunion since they hadn't seen each other since Thompson's memorial signing and *attempts* to explore the thoughts and reasons behind Steadman's art and why it's so personal to him. This film fails also because it doesn't let the audience in to the thinking of Steadman. In other words, this entire film is one huge intimate story about an artist and his art that only the artist has any likelihood of understanding.
As well, the constant shots of Depp wearing expensive clothing and talking about how art defines the artist among other things suggests that Depp only agreed to be documented to show how fascinating he is. I can't confirm that Depp honestly just wanted to show how great he is but there are too many points in the film that point to that to not believe it.
The documentations of Steadman's wacky adventures with Thompson are somewhat interesting but never rise above what has been written and talked about for decades now. In fact, Paul makes it a big reveal that Steadman was even wackier than Thompson as if that fact isn't already well established. This shows a lack of actual knowledge by the filmmaker.
Despite this harsh review I have written, I can't say that For No Good Reason is that awful. There are some fascinating ideas presented throughout the film. However, it's too self congratulatory and is too often like an ideal example of documentary filmmaking 101. It's not particularly dreadful...it's just dull textbook material at hand here.
(1 and 1/2 out of 5 Stars, The film is rated R for language, some drug content and brief sexual images)
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