What
Can We Do?
Charles Bukowski
at their best, there is gentleness in Humanity.
some understanding and, at times, acts of
courage
but all in all it is a mass, a glob that doesn't
have too much.
it is like a large animal deep in sleep and
almost nothing can awaken it.
when activated it's best at brutality,
selfishness, unjust judgments, murder.
what can we do with it, this Humanity?
nothing.
avoid the thing as much as possible.
treat it as you would anything poisonous,
vicious
and mindless.
but be careful. it has enacted laws to protect
itself from you.
it can kill you without cause.
and to escape it you must be subtle.
few escape.
it's up to you to figure a plan.
I have met nobody who has escaped.
I have met some of the great and
famous but they have not escaped
for they are only great and famous within
Humanity.
I have not escaped
but I have not failed in trying again and
again.
before my death I hope to obtain my
life.
Watching Mickey Rourke literally consume the
role of Hank, a Los Angeles drifter who turned
poet late in life but who nonetheless spends
much of his time drinking and fucking and
fucking and drinking then fucking and fighting
and drinking to the point of orgasm.
"Barfly," penned by noted street poet Charles
Bukowski with the same hard edge and dark
despair mixed with fucked up romanticism that
became a trademark of Bukowski's writing.
"Barfly" is a simple film in which Rourke lives
out his pathetic existence in a drunken stupor
until one day Wanda (played by Faye Dunaway), a
woman who simultaneously appears classy but
oddly like all the other skid row drunks,
stumbles into the bar building a connection that
would last allowing Hank to turn his downward
spiral into a lifetime of poetry that would
touch, inspire, challenge and provoke.
Rourke's recent appearance in "Sin City" served
to remind all of us that Rourke is a brilliant
actor, and that his own downward spiral trashed
what had been a bright, hopeful career. "Barfly"
was filmed in the early stages of Rourke's
downfall, and it is perhaps his own moments of
despair and bewilderment that come vividly to
life on the screen.
Both Rourke and Dunaway are cinematic dynamite
here, offering performance that sizzle with a
street grit that is seldom captured onscreen,
and they are surrounded with a Frank Milleresque
type of production design that is captivating,
depressing, hypnotic and, at times, downright
overwhelming. The cinematography often brings to
mind Bukowski's poem "Hug the Dark", in which
the lead character literally is consumed by the
darkness of the world.
"Barfly" has limited audience appeal because of
its authenticity and because of director Barbet
Schroeder's faithfulness to the source material
of Bukowski. Throughout his writing years,
Bukowski never held back even if it meant
slandering his own name. "Barfly" is more than
just a powerful film...it, quite literally, is
the life of Charles Bukowski brought to life
with magnificence by Mickey Rourke, Faye Dunaway
and, in a lesser role, Alice Krige. Nearly 20
years after my first viewing, "Barfly" remains a
film that is deeply etched within my psyche,
haunting my visions even as I read "Love is Dog
from Hell" for the umpteenth time.
©
Written by Richard Propes
TC Candler's Comment
N/A
Jacob
Hall's Comment
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