Some shithead or another writing captions for Amazon Prime referred to Jerry Stahl’s autobiographical work as “allegedly true.” That’s the funny thing about autobiographies and memoirs though. They’re all usually true to the best of the knowledge and memory of the author. Drug memoirs, casting aside the knowledge that addicts can be pathological bullshitters, might just be more true than most. Who would make the ghastly stuff up, sign their own name to it and say, “Yup, that’s me. That degenerate piece of shit is me.” This of course notwithstanding the self-loathing inherent to addicts as well. Still, speaking with some degree of knowledge on the topic, drug memoirs are probably as close as you’ll get to fact in the autobiographical genre.

The film itself? Hell, the film is an awful lot better than anyone who’s seen a Ben Stiller movie might expect. He is more than credible in this role. He is, at times, as grotesque as the role demands, and again, I speak with some degree of knowledge on the subject. I was impressed. He was definitely more convincing in the chaotic scenes than the quiet, reflective scenes but that might come down to direction. Nothing was bad enough to deny him a pass. this is not his purview. The story is typical. You never really get a chance to see his initial decline into the shit. The film starts with him on a seemingly level bottom. Every bottom has a trapdoor though, as is said, and few addicts have any problems stumbling and shambling into them, so the rest is inevitable. My one gripe with the film is that were it a bit longer the story could have been told better. It could have also made it a very tedious affair too. That’s the problem with the lives of addicts. They’re generally even more boring than anyone can imagine. They’re spent mostly sitting around. That’s the real horror. It’s the boredom. For every addict that dies tragically at a young age there’s a dozen that live tragically and seemingly forever. It’s hard to say which cases are more sad

But I digress. Permanent Midnight isn’t the carnival ride that a lot of drug movies end up being. It’s by no means forgettable but it’s not garish like for example, Requiem for a Dream. You won’t light up when discussing it with someone else who’s seen it and start rattling off memorable quotes. It’s just not that kind of movie, so in that sense, it’s better. It’s a real life story and that’s the killer. Jerry Stahl became more successful at being a junkie than he could ever have been as a writer. Addiction is a mess that way. Forget a permanent midnight; it can be like a permanent stain or a birthmark. It’s the first thing a lot of people will see when you go anywhere. That’s scary. It takes a lot of spine to reach a point where everyone else is telling your story and the only thing left to do is own it and tell it yourself.

Definitely glad I finally saw it. I’ve known about the movie for a long time now but didn’t go out of my way to watch it. It wasn’t a case of fear really but there was a deliberate avoidance. That’s something to be sorted out at another time.