The Doom Generation

Underground director Gregg Araki's latest film maintains a simultaneously giddy and disturbing tone, refusing to take anything, including its own nihilism, seriously. A road movie in which the characters never actually seem to go anywhere, The Doom Generation chronicles the violent misadventures of three disaffected youths: Amy (Rose McGowan), the after-hours dream date who retains a touch of romanticism; her blank boyfriend, Jordan (James Duval); and attractive drifter Xavier (Johnathon Schaech), whose perversity goes beyond plain polymorphousness. Not for everyone, the film should give fans of Natural Born Killers an even more rewarding demonstration of the aesthetics of willful incoherence. B+