The film brings us to the late 60s teenagers everyday life from a New York City in the USA. The main actor is Jim and his friends from catholic school are on the best basketball team in New York. Parallel with this Jimmy writes his thoughts into his small diary including his experiments with drugs, that lead him to addiction and erects huge problems with rehabilitation. He lost everything that he had before and nobody could help or give him an advice. The main idea is that even if you have a dream and all possibilities and qualities to receive it, you can lose everything with one decision, which will have consequences in another part of your life. My favorite scene is where Jim went to his friend Bobby demonstrated to him that Bobby important to him. It was also very hard psychological moment, when he started to fight and wouldn't give up to make his life as it used to be. And I also like the scene, where he stays alone and starts to write poetry or only his thoughts in his diary, which hit to the depths of the soul and help audience Toto visit his skin and feel the same.

Not a perfect movie and I'm not sure how faithful it is to poet (Jim Carroll's) memoirs but worth watching for the remarkable performance from Leonardo DiCaprio. Just wow, absolutely raw and heart wrenching especially at the height of his addiction. I'd also forgotten that Mark Wahlberg is in this (very young Marky-Mark days) and also Juliette Lewis.The entire movie is very dark and inconsistent in its storytelling but filled with excellent performances; following Carroll (DiCaprio) as a 1960's teen, his star basketball days and subsequent spiral into heroin addiction along with a few of his school buddies. Crime, homelessness, prostitution and chaos ensue. 02.01.14 Quotes: "First, it's a Saturday night thing when you feel cool like a gangster or a rockstar -just something to kill the boredom, you know? They call it a chippie, a small habit. It feels so good, you start doing it on Tuesdays... then Thursdays... then it's got you. Every wise ass punk on the block says it won't happen to them, but it does."

This film isn't for everyone, you either hate it or love it. It sometimes lacks that constant up-beat easy to watch feel that certain types of audiences need to enjoy a film and is replaced with brutal honesty.The performances from all of the actors were outstanding, with Leonardo DiCaprio performing some of the best acting I have ever seen. His portrayal of Jim was so real and raw that he gave so much of himself to the role that it began to look effortless. So many scenes in this movie were beautifully done. A few stand out moments to name: The basketball scene in the rain, every confrontation between Jim and his mother, and the Withdrawal scene where once again Leo gives a spine tingling performance. If you want to enjoy The Basketball diaries you must go into it with an open mind and take the film for what it is. It isn't a fancy, modern, stylized, glamorized film about drugs but rather an honest, raw, bold and touching movie about the self-destruction of a boy who falls head first into the harrowing world of drug addiction. This movie for me is an overlooked, underrated piece of art. Which is why I love it. I wouldn't change one thing about it.

Basketball Diaries, The (1995) *** 1/2 (out of 4) Powerful adaptation of Jim Carroll's autobiographical account of his free fall from good student to heroin addict isn't a pretty film to watch but there's no denying its power. Leonard DiCaprio, in his first starring role, plays Carroll who when we first meet him is playing sports and is still in school but soon his minor drug habits start to spin out of control and he finds himself hooked, living on the streets and any hope for the future is nearly gone. I remember going to see THE BASKETBALL DIARIES a week after my fifteenth birthday and still remember what effect it had on me. I really didn't understand all the negative reviews the movie got at the time of its release but I found the film to be remarkably powerful and the message against drug abuse is still very strong in today's time. What all people then agreed on is that star DiCaprio seemed like he could do anything in the world. Coming after supporting roles in films like THIS BOYS LIFE and WHAT'S EATING GILBERT GRAPE, this was certainly a departure from those two films but it was a real eye-opener because there's some of the most raw and powerful acting that you're ever going to see. The final thirty-minutes of the film pretty much has DiCaprio playing a drugged out character who is just inches away from death and the brutality of the performance is something one isn't going to forget. This is hands down a performance that once you see it it's unlikely to leave your mind and DiCaprio really gives it his all and it's really hard to think of another actor out there who could have given so much to the part. The way DiCaprio just crumbles under the drug abuse is so chilling and haunting that you really do feel as if you're watching a real addict and not just an actor playing a part. The support cast are also quite good with Ernie Hudson coming off extremely strong as a man trying to save the kid and Lorraine Bracco as his mother. Mark Wahlberg, Bruno Kirby and Juliette Lewis are also strong in their roles. I think there are a few issues with the film including too much attempted style by the director and this is really apparent during a sequence where DiCaprio is suffering from withdrawals. The acting is strong enough so the stylistic touches by the director are more distracting than anything else. The screenplay has taken some heat from people but I thought it was pretty good and captured the free-spirit of the novel, which it's based on. THE BASKETBALL DIARIES is as relevant today as it was when first released and it's certainly a terrific showcase for its star who has gone on to prove all those early critics right when they called him one of the greatest actors coming up. The film is a haunting reminder of the downsides of drugs and the rawness of the performances make it hard to watch at times but there's no denying its power.