The Rum Diary Gets Blogged

Sorry, the movie “The Rum Diary” isn’t about rum, and I didn’t hear the word diary once.  Yes, they drink rum often; after all, the action is set in the home of Bacardi, Puerto Rico, in 1960.  The name Bacardi is mentioned one time.   Maybe my high school English teacher would be disappointed that I failed to recognize that rum is the metaphor for all the temptations that bring out the human frailties that prevent us from reaching our full potential and that my connotation of diary is just way too narrow.

I do, however, get asked frequently about this movie and its contribution to the rum world.  So here goes.

What would be the worst drinking game while watching this movie?  Take a drink every time someone says, “Rum.”   

• ·         Rum is first mentioned 15½ minutes into the movie (counting HBO intro credits). 
• ·         Second mention at 34½ minutes. (+19 minutes)
• ·         Third time the word rum is said is at 49 minutes. (+15 minutes)
• ·         Fourth comes at 1 hour 15 minutes. (+26 minutes)
• ·         Fifth follows at 1 hour 20 minutes. (+5 minutes)
• ·         Sixth at 1 hour 32 minutes. (+12 minutes)
• ·         Movie ends at 1 hour 55 minutes.  (+23 minutes with no additional mention)

Anyone would say that’s just not the pace a screenwriter would mention rum if the movie was really about rum.  This movie is about a novelist who discovers he’s really an investigative journalist destined to expose the corruption of government and big business.  Oh, my, this is a Johnny Depp movie, isn’t it. 

The Rum Diary, based on the novel by Hunter S. Thompson, follows journalist and would-be novelist, Paul Kemp, played by Johnny Depp, in 1960’s Puerto Rico.  Paul drinks more than his share of rum, and promises to cut back, then eventually to stop drinking it altogether.  As he sails off into the sunset—literally—at the end of the movie, we never find out if he either cuts back or quits. 

Imagine Paul Kemp romping around Puerto Rico more than 30 years before the excellent rums of today were even distilled and poured into their barrels for aging.  Throughout the movie, we are teased with miniatures and glasses we are left to assume are rum. 

In one scene, 10 Puerto Rican Rum bottles are struck down by a bowling ball making a Brooklyn pocket hit in what any bowler would recognize as an improbable shot, and any rum lover would declare to be a waste of 227 shots.  (Assuming the bottles are 1 liter size.) 

Unfortunately, never does anyone in the movie call for a rum by name, or is any indication given that there’s a difference among rums.  Rum is just referred to as “rum.”  The characters drink it like it’s domestic beer.  Thus, we rum drinkers learn nothing from this movie about rum.  The lazy screen play writers failed to invest even an afternoon in researching the rich history of rum in Puerto Rico.  To their credit, the photographers caught fantastic camera angles that showed off Puerto Rico in its most favorable panoramas.  Rum—well, that was just background that happened to be mentioned in the title of the movie.  They should have titled it “Depp in the Heart of Palms.“  No, really, I’ll get over it.  This movie won’t be a classic.  The biggest problem for us is that from now on when we Google rum, we’ll have to scroll past all the useless “The Rum Diary” references that’ll come up first.