The film The Rum Diary is based on a book written by Hunter S. Thompson. The movie was directed by Bruce Robinson and was filmed in Puerto Rico. American actor Johnny Depp interpreted an American journalist called Paul Kemp who hasn't been successful in the United States and started working for the San Juan Star newspaper in our island during the 1960s.
The Rum Diary is similar to the Jamaica Kincaid's novel A Small Place. Jamaica Kincaid attacked the tourists in a way the reader can assume the tourist's role and felt offended by her writing. Paul Kemp arrived to Puerto Rico without any knowledge about the island. Kincaid said about this: "A tourist is an ugly human being." And why not? At first, he didn't know anything about our culture, the Puerto Rican lifestyle or even the economic status. He was an outsider who was hired to write about horoscopes until he faced the reality of Puerto Rico and started caring about the problems in the island after relating with Sala. Kemp became more interested in the situations of the island: poverty, alcoholism, ignorance, etc.
Kemp changed throughout the movie. His transition can be defined with two scenes. The first was at the beginning of the movie. The taxi driver asked him something in Spanish and he replied he don't speak Spanish. This is a clear example of his outsider (tourist) view. The second scene is the one at the bowling alley. Kemp asked a tourist: "What you like most of Puerto Rico?" The tourist replied: “The bowling alley and the casinos." Kemp asked him: "Have you seen a lot of the island?". The tourist's wife replied: “We never leave the hotel. It is not safe”. His last question was: “But you are having fun, right? The woman replied: “Oh yeah, lots of fun! “. Here is Kincaid's voice: "The tourist is an ugly human being." After that, he wanted to write about the issues of Puerto Rico and he can be seen as an insider or partially insider (traveler).
At the end of the movie, Kemp went back to the United States and became a successful writer. It is also a transition from an unsuccessful to a successful journey. It was a change of his perspective toward Puerto Rico and its locals. Kemp was able to understand the issue's location of the Puerto Ricans and sympathize with them in a good way.
I agree with you that Kemp did change throughout the movie. He was looking for his own vision and his own voice and he found it. Great post!
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that Kemp's perspective towards Puerto Rico changed at the end. He grew in an emotional sense. Good Post!
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