The Living End

You can view the film narrowly as commentary on the soul-crushing fury of being HIV positive, or take a few steps back and see Araki's film in a more universal sense as the disintegration of human values caused by an obsessive culturewide drive for self-satisfaction and indifference to others. The Living End is much more than a time capsule, thanks to Araki's daring as a filmmaker.

Proudly declaring itself "an irresponsible movie" yet pointedly aimed at politicians who have done little to address a lethal epidemic, Gregg Araki's The Living End is in fact an attempt to make a morally charged statement about the AIDS crisis. [11 Sep 1992, p.03]

With a volatile combination of passion and bad manners, Araki ushers an old formula into the age of AIDS, and gives it new meaning. [31 Aug 1992, p.68]

Araki used to make fumbling anti-dramas about the flotsam of Los Angeles: depressed, ambivalent, uncommitted. This is really different. It's a queer 'couple-on-the-lam' movie, crammed with genre memories but closer to a bent Pierrot le Fou than to anything out of Hollywood.

As a portrait of late-millennial nihilism, The Living End rejects the sympathetic bent of every afflicted-by-AIDS portrayal before or since.

More admirable as a sheer technical feat of filmmaking than as a sustained dramatic narrative. It still makes worthwhile viewing.

By the time the deathwish duo embark into mountainous terrain, you'll want to hand them a copy of Thelma & Louise's road map —with clearly marked directions to the cliff.