Word: opiumeators
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...these days are desperate for escapism. If that mood holds, From Hell, opening this week, may be just what the doctor ordered. Especially if the doctor's name is Jekyll or Moreau. From Hell is Hollywood's latest search for Jack the Ripper. It stars Johnny Depp as an opium-addicted Victorian cop and Heather Graham as one of the prostitutes stalked by the madman in London's low-rent Whitechapel district in 1888. It's a shocking movie, to be sure, but this is its most unexpected twist: it is directed by the Hughes brothers, twins Allen and Albert...
What we do know is afforded by the convenient dramatic device of Abberline’s “visions” of the murders. While drifting in and out of an opium-induced haze, he sees details—tinted, blurry city-scapes and half concealed, shadowy murders—only to wake up and have these apparitions confirmed on the streets. Even awake, Depp wanders in a somewhat dreamlike trance through the crimes, with little in the way of actual detective work or even acting. Depp, a badass no matter what accent you foist upon him, never truly...
...example: I was sitting in a carpet shop in Quetta, drinking green tea with some Afghan traders. First they talked about how their investment in opium had taken a beating (the price dropped from $700 a kilo to $200 since Sept 11th, because the Taliban commanders who'd stockpiled tons of opium were nervously selling it off), and then the conversation turned to the dud Cruise missiles which had landed around Kandahar. These traders shifted eagerly on their stacks of plum-dark Bokharas and somber tribal Baluch carpets...
...which, although taken in Paris, have probably been included in this collection simply because, for the purposes of description, they might as well have been taken in America) depict the moral bankruptcy and decadence of the 1930's in terms of space and the objects that occupy it. An opium pipe, a negligent smoker of that pipe, and the chaise lounge upon which she sleeps are the focal point of "An Opium Smoker Asleep," which simultaneously chronicles and criticizes the social norms of the 1930's Paris demimonde. Lighting is dark and the focus is dim: the space is uninviting...
...Fitz explains that he's trying to taper off. And he plans to smuggle into Thailand a few opium pellets that he can boil in a pot of tea and drink. He'll be getting out, he swears. He's not going to stay in some Lao backwater, the Asian equivalent of Appalachia, just because the dope is cheap and plentiful. You want to believe him, you really do, but you just know he's not going anywhere...