The End of the Tour (2015)
Directed by James Ponsoldt Starring Jason Segel and Jesse Eisenberg
In a meaningful way, you're going to die. - David Foster Wallace, The End of the Tour.
-- Spoilers --
The End of the Tour is a 2015 film based on David Lipsky’s book Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself: A Road Trip with David Foster Wallace. The movie takes place over five days where Lipsky is interviewing Wallace for an article he is writing for Rolling Stone magazine. The five days are also the final days of the Infinite Jest book tour, Wallace's most notable work.
The movie begins in 2008, when news of Wallace’s death reaches Lipsky. We are then taken back through cassette tape recordings of when the two authors first met. Wallace obviously made a really big impact on Lipsky’s life and career, as he recalls the days he got to spend with Wallace with fondness and sadness.
The film is greatly just conversation between Lipsky and Wallace, and the really seamless way the interview juggles between mundane topics and serious ones. There’s this tension throughout the film between both authors. Wallace is really worried about how he will be portrayed in the article Lipsky is writing, and Lipsky is a little jealous of how gifted Wallace is as a writer. When he begins to read Infinite Jest, he exclaims something along the lines of, “Damn, it really is as good as everyone says,”
He is more so mesmerised, I think, the relationship between the authors similar to that of a younger and older brother. Lipsky even gives Wallace a copy of his own book, which I found to be a really sweet part of the film. I think both authors are portrayed as real people and are likeable despite their less likeable characteristics.
The tension of the film reaches its climax when Wallace accuses Lipsky of hitting on one of his exes that they had met up with while on tour. He is simply paranoid that Lipsky will ask her questions about his past and the much danced around topic of his rumoured drug use.
I’m not sure if this was only me, but I also felt some sexual tension between the authors. Was it the fact that underneath everything there was some competitiveness and it just came through as being slightly sexual in nature? Or was there really something there? The former is more likely.
I also liked how the director didn’t feel the need to over explain everything. The film treats the audience as though we are smart, and I always appreciate that in a film.
Both actors give a remarkable performance. Anyone who knows me knows Jesse Eisenberg is one of my top five favourite actors, he literally never disappoints. And although I’ve never had any complaints about Jason Segel, he’s also never really stood out to me. This was the strongest performance I’ve seen from him. Perhaps it’s that I usually only see him in comedies and in this one he played a more serious role, but I think he did a really genuine job of portraying the complexity that is a creative mind.
Overall, I really enjoyed the film and felt nostalgic throughout it, even though I have never read either authors’ works.