The Doors 1990

The Doors supplied plenty of post-Independence Day fireworks on July 5, 1968 when the legendary quartet played the Hollywood Bowl, a concert that is considered to be the band s finest on film. For the first time, the film from the historic performance has been painstakingly restored using the original camera negatives and the audio has been remixed and mastered from original multi-tracks by the group s engineer Bruce Botnick.

Val Kilmer delivers what was considered one of 1991's best performances as Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's hallucinatory bio-pic of the seminal 1960s rock group The Doors. Stone cuts a jagged swath through Morrison's life, starting with a childhood memory where Morrison sees an elderly Indian dying by the roadside. It picks up with Morrison's arrival in California and his assimilation into the Venice Beach culture, followed by his film school days at UCLA; his introduction to his girlfriend Pamela Courson (Meg Ryan); his first encounters with Ray Manzarek (Kyle MacLachlan); and the origin of The Doors – made up of Manzarek, Robby Kreiger (Frank Whaley), and John Densmore (Kevin Dillon). As the fame of The Doors grows, Morrison's obsession with death increases. The band grows weary of Morrison's missed recording sessions and no-shows at concerts. Morrison, meanwhile, sinks deeper into a drug-induced haze, having mystical sexual encounters with Patricia Kennealy (Kathleen Quinlan), an older rock journalist involved with sadomasochism and witchcraft.

Tommaso Scalia is a man who commits three murders: he killed his superior who sacked him, he kills the man who replaced him, and he kills his own wife. He wants a quick trial and an early execution, but an earnest, principled assistant judge looks for a way to save the murderer from being shot, because he does not belive in capital punishment. Although he manages to save the man initially, he will pay a high price for it.

Val Kilmer delivers what was considered one of 1991's best performances as Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's hallucinatory bio-pic of the seminal 1960s rock group The Doors. Stone cuts a jagged swath through Morrison's life, starting with a childhood memory where Morrison sees an elderly Indian dying by the roadside. It picks up with Morrison's arrival in California and his assimilation into the Venice Beach culture, followed by his film school days at UCLA; his introduction to his girlfriend Pamela Courson (Meg Ryan); his first encounters with Ray Manzarek (Kyle MacLachlan); and the origin of The Doors – made up of Manzarek, Robby Kreiger (Frank Whaley), and John Densmore (Kevin Dillon). As the fame of The Doors grows, Morrison's obsession with death increases. The band grows weary of Morrison's missed recording sessions and no-shows at concerts. Morrison, meanwhile, sinks deeper into a drug-induced haze, having mystical sexual encounters with Patricia Kennealy (Kathleen Quinlan), an older rock journalist involved with sadomasochism and witchcraft.

Thanks in large part to its meticulous re-creation of the late 1960s and early 1970s rock scene and the uncannily authentic performance by Val Kilmer as legendary Doors front man Jim Morrison, Oliver Stone's hypnotic film biography is standing the test of time. Capturing the carefree mood of the Age of Aquarius, the film charts the meteoric rise of the Doors on the California club circuit (including a memorable scene showing the creation of the hit "Light My Fire"), and chronicles the band's exploits with hallucinogenics and Morrison's battles against charges of public indecency on stage. Kilmer's performance is hauntingly perfect, and performances by Meg Ryan, Kathleen Quinlan, and Kyle MacLachlan are similarly impressive. The movie doesn't fully probe the depths of Morrison's character, but as a portrait of excess it is vividly true to the spirit of the self-destructive poet known to his fans as "The Lizard King."

Oliver Stone's homage to 1960s rock group The Doors also doubles as a biography of the group's late singer, the "Electric Poet" Jim Morrison. The movie follows Morrison from his days as a film student in Los Angeles to his death in Paris, France at age 27 in 1971. The movie features a tour-de-force performance by Val Kilmer, who not only looks like Jim Morrison's long-lost twin brother, but also sounds so much like him that he did much of his own singing. It has been written that even the surviving Doors had trouble distinguishing Kilmer's vocals from Morrison's originals.