Drugstore Cowboy

drugstore cowboy is gus van sant’s second film, a black comedy about addiction that rides on matt dillon’s performance as bob hughes, the charismatic leader of a crew of pharmacy-robbing addicts in 1971 portland. the film treats its characters not as villains but as sick people forming a makeshift family, which is what makes the humor land: these are people whose slowed-down responses and superstitious logic (the hex, the hat) are symptoms of their condition, not quirks.

the crew is bob’s wife dianne (kelly lynch), his best friend rick (james legros), and rick’s teenage girlfriend nadine (heather graham). they travel the pacific northwest knocking over pharmacies and hospitals, burying their stash outside to stay ahead of detective gentry (james remar), who knows exactly who is responsible but cannot prove it. when nadine fatally overdoses on stolen dilaudid, bob decides to get clean through a 21-day methadone program. the rest of the film is the aftermath: bob’s new life in a long-stay motel, gentry’s surprising encouragement, dianne’s return to drop off a package of drugs and say goodbye, and a final confrontation with a rival named david that puts bob in an ambulance heading toward, as he notes in voice-over, “the fattest pharmacy in town.”

the supporting cast is part of why the film endures. william s. burroughs shows up as father tom, an elderly junkie priest who bob remembers from his altar-boy days. the cameo could have been a gag but burroughs plays it straight: weathered, sad, grateful for a bottle of dilaudid. the result feels like death himself wandered onto the set. max perlich as david, the twitchy low-life who eventually shoots bob, is the film’s embodiment of the life bob is trying to leave behind: desperate, petty, and incapable of imagining anyone could actually quit.

the film’s visual language is grounded in portland’s industrial skeleton: lovejoy columns, rail yards, cheap motels, a pharmacy on nw glisan street. cinematographer robert yeoman (who would later shoot most of wes anderson’s films) gives the whole thing a washed-out, overcast look that matches the characters’ internal weather. elliot goldenthal’s score mixes avant-garde electronic textures with period needle-drops (abbey lincoln, desmond dekker, count five), anchoring the film in 1971 without turning it into a jukebox.

drugstore cowboy won four independent spirit awards (best male lead for dillon, best screenplay for van sant and daniel yost, best cinematography for yeoman, best supporting male for perlich) and swept the national society of film critics (best film, best director). roger ebert gave it four stars and called dillon’s performance “one of the great recent american movie performances.” criterion released it on 4k in 2025, which is how a film this grimy earns its place in the permanent collection. the film has a cult following for good reason: it is one of the few drug movies that understands addiction is not about glamour or moral failure but about the slow erosion of everything else until the drug is the only thing left, and then, maybe, even that is not enough.