The Beach Bum

The Beach Bum is a 2019 American stoner comedy film written and directed by Harmony Korine and starring Matthew McConaughey, Snoop Dogg, Isla Fisher, Jimmy Buffett in his final feature film, Zac Efron and Martin Lawrence, with Stefania LaVie Owen and Jonah Hill in supporting roles.

The plot follows the adventures of stoner poet Moondog (McConaughey) in and around the Florida Keys as he tries to finish his new novel and fight for the respect of his daughter and his share of his wife's estate after she dies in a car accident.

After arriving late to Heather's wedding in Miami, Moondog's infidelity leads to a drunken altercation with the groom, Frank, in front of the guests.

Back in Miami, Moondog encounters "Captain Wack," an old friend and alleged Vietnam veteran who offers him a co-captain position on dolphin tours.

Inspired by a dream and experience shared with Lingerie and Jimmy Buffett, Moondog adopts crossdressing to evade detection.

Following the release of Spring Breakers and time spent living in Florida, writer-director Harmony Korine penned The Beach Bum, which is "based loosely on a set of characters he was hanging out with in the Keys".

[6] Journalist Zach Baron noted Korine "wrote the film swiftly, and then, as he did with Spring Breakers, Korine cast a mix of well-known actors", such as Matthew McConaughey, Jonah Hill, Zac Efron,[7] Martin Lawrence, Jimmy Buffett, Snoop Dogg, Isla Fisher[8]—"and real-life Florida denizens".

[6] Speaking about the connection between the cast of Hollywood stars and the local grit of Florida, Korine said, "I like when they meet in the middle [...] Like when all the secondary characters, and all the locations, all the color, the sky, everything, it affects the main roles in a way.

John Lesher, Steve Golin, Charles-Marie Anthonioz, Mourad Belkeddar and Nicholas Lhermitte produced the film under the LeGrisbi Productions, Anonymous Content and Iconoclast banners.

Additional strange inspiration came to Korine, as while eating a panini sandwich, the director thought that the pattern would "look good on Zac's face".

[14] In the United States and Canada, The Beach Bum was released alongside Dumbo and Unplanned, and was projected to gross $2–4 million from 1,100 theaters in its opening weekend.

The website's critical consensus reads, "The role of a lifetime for Matthew McConaughey, The Beach Bum is set apart by Harmony Korine's distinctive style, but that isn't always enough to offset the unfocused story.

There's a collage quality to Korine's filmmaking—a sense that he's always just collecting moments, cobbling together scenes from the endless supply of improvised festivity that presumably erupted on set".