River Phoenix died on Halloween night, 1993, He was 23 years old, and had just three weeks of interior shots left on what would be his last film, Dark Blood.
Dark Blood is about a disaffected young man named “Boy” who lives by himself in a survivalist bunker in the desert, surrounded by weapons and assorted “voodoo”/occult items. In his last role as Boy, was Phoenix basically “replaying” a version of his own strange childhood? And is Boy the person he could have grown up to be, had Hollywood not entered the picture?
River Phoenix in “Dark Blood”
This movie was made around the same time of a number of Federal sieges on “compounds” such as the Branch Davidians (1993) and Ruby Ridge (1992). So in a sense Phoenix’s character Boy is the analogue for this sort of situation.
But River Phoenix’s childhood was also mired in what could be considered cult-like, his parents pressing the children into the hippie-like Children of God cult.
The Children of God (Family International) were established in 1968 by David Berg, lived in isolated communes, and purported to be living out the “authentic” form of Christianity that Jesus had intended—compare to David Koresh’s Branch Davidians at Waco.
CoG was also involved in the controversial practice of “Flirty Fishing,” in which women were instructed to seek out more converts by offering them sex. While Phoenix’s parents later stated that they were opposed to this practice—you have to wonder how all of this CoG stuff impacted the young boy mentally.
a young River Phoenix
From an 1994 article on Phoenix from Esquire:
“The family had had prophet problems before: They’d actually left the Children of God because its leader, David Brant Berg, began encouraging the women in his flock to seduce potential converts—a tactic known as “flirty fishing”—and proudly referred to them as hookers for Jesus. Berg also advocated incest and sex with toddlers, and mailed circulars with graphic pictures of molestation. The Phoenixes felt betrayed, and River rarely talked about the sect. ‘They’re disgusting,’ he would say angrily. ‘They’re ruining people’s lives.'”
There is also the significance of the name of his last movie: Dark Blood. The actor was set to start filming Interview With The Vampire shortly before he died—a role that later went to Christian Slater, who in turn donated his paycheck to two of Phoenix’s favorite charities.
Christian Slater in the role originally meant for Phoenix
Compare Slater’s actions to how Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell, and Jude Law pitched in for Heath Ledger in The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus. Both Ledger and Phoenix died of drug overdoses.
Time, places, and events seem to repeat itself—to re-cycle and intertwine. Phoenix died in front of Depp’s club The Viper Room on that Halloween night. Depp has deep connections with two other tragic “died too young actors,” Brandon Lee (who died the same year as Phoenix) and Heath Ledger.
The Viper Room
Phoenix, Lee, and Kurt Cobain—young idols who all died within a year of each other. Ruby Ridge and Waco—also within a year of each other. All in the same time period.
Cobain, Lee, Phoenix
Dark Blood finally gets seen for the first time between 2012/2013. During that period, we get the Aurora “Joker” shootings, Sandy Hook, and a rash of other “lone nut” tragedies. Indeed, it seems like a horrific “renaissance” of the mass shooter—various permutations of the disaffected loner, like the character Phoenix played in his last role.
Then the names Ruby Ridge and Waco were once again invoked in relation to 2015’s standoff at Malheur (which translated from French means “misfortune” and “tragedy”) National Wildlife Refuge in OR; only a few months after the ill-omened Viper Club reopened, complete with tasteless River Phoenix death tribute. From the ashes, so to speak.
The “new” Viper Room
None of these “connections” really mean anything…but they sometimes make an interesting collection of things to think about when you have nothing better to do. As is the fact that Christian Slater, who managed to come out of the tumultuous mid-1990s more or less intact, went on to embody the (albeit somewhat aging) spirit of Nineties anarchism in the TV series Mr. Robot.
One last intriguing bit about Dark Blood, again from the Esquire article:
Last fall Phoenix filmed Dark Blood in an area in Utah reputed to be a magnet for alien visitations, which fascinated him (his latest karmic catchphrase was “Thanks be to UFO Godmother”). He told friends he’d been levitated over his bed, and he would sometimes lie on his patio and shout to the heavens, “Take me, I’m ready! What else is out there?”
What else, indeed?
Note: a version of this article originally appeared in Butterfly Language.
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