The Making of Drugstore Cowboy (1999)

Portland 1988 Filmmaker Gus Van Sant shoots Drugstore Cowboy the project that will bring he and his collaborators a formidable burst of mainstream attention Starring Matt Dillon Kelly Lynch and Heather Graham the film follows a roving quartet of drug addicts and consequently drug thieves especially from the businesses of the title who wash up in Portlands thengritty Pearl District A death among their own spooks the leader of the pack into trying to clean up and an encounter with a sepulchral junkie priest does its part to convince him further Or maybe we should call him a Junkie priest portrayed as he is by a controversial cameo from writer William S Burroughs Im going back to the old days Burroughs says of his role early in the above documentary on the making of Drugstore Cowboy The old days when they used to give people morphine in jail The old days before the methadone programs