Less Than Zero Details

Long before American Psycho made the transition to the big screen this equally nihilistic Bret Easton Ellis novel appeared, mapping out the fag end of 1980s yuppie-dom with its tale of Beverly Hills rich kids spaced out on drugs and drifting from sports cars to nightclubs. Unusually strong material for a studio movie, although the more controversial aspects of Ellis's book were toned down to benefit a rather conventional love story, Another Country director Marek Kanievska handles his cast well, drawing exceptional performances from James Spader as a smarmy pusher and Robert Downey Jr in an art-imitating-life role as a desperate addict. Still, compared to the absorbing Christiane F, this anti-drugs message film too often resembles an R-rated episode of Beverly Hills 90210.

Limp attempt to film a best-selling novel of the blank generation, concentrating not so much on the despair and self-pity of the participants as on their enviable life-style.