"Drugstore Cowboy" was one of the best movies of the 1980s. It was one of Gus van Sant's first films, and he uses some very creative directing tricks to capture the story's mood. In the film, a crew of four young adults rob drug stores and live an underworld life. But van Sant focuses on their characters, capturing the laughter and pleasures in their dead end lives.

It's a great script, with some funny stories. In one scene, they get revenge on a hard-nosed police officer named Gentry by suggesting to a neighbor that the cop is the neighborhood's peeping Tom. In another they're stuck with a dead body in a hotel - only to discover it's hosting a convention of police officers. An obnoxious local kid becomes their mark for crooked drug deals. And one flashback tells the story of how they came to conclude that dogs are bad luck.

The movie does communicates the downside of drug addiction, but it doesn't make that the film's central focus. A comical superstition haunts the gang's ringleader, Bob, and it's only a horrific string of bad luck that makes him consider rehab. William S. Burroughs appears as an unreformed junky priest, warning that the war on drugs will be used to restrict civil liberties - as he receives a fresh packet heroin. The drug-busting police officer is more interested in revenge than sobriety. And the movie's one violent drug deal arrives with ironic contradictions

Throughout the film there's good musical choices, but they're just one of the ways van Sant shows his amazing creativity. He uses clever visual techniques to suggest the gradual onset of a drug-induced euphoria. Footage of fast-moving clouds suggests the passage of time while the narrator moves the story along. And the comical scenes are compressed into an intense montage of flashbacks.

But there's also a fond nostalgia lingering behind the story, which is set in the 1970s. When the characters television, van Sant even makes sure they were seeing vintage local ads from the 1970s. Bobby talks about watching "Outer Limits" - shortly before purchasing some of their stolen drugs. And it opens poignantly with narration from Matt Dillon, as the film's four characters are remembered in faded home movie footage, while a sentimental old song plays in the background.

It's touches like these that make this one of the most memorable movies I've ever seen. Ultimately "Drugstore Cowboy" isn't just a great story - it's also a great act of film-making.

Learn more about this author, Moe Zilla.
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