BUKOWSKI: BORN INTO THIS

WAS BUKOWSKI'S LIFE FACT OR FICTION? | May 29, 2004

Special appearances by Buk’s buddies Bono, Sean Penn
In select theatres (See playdates below)

 

Womanizing bastard. Insolent egoist. Bukowski was a rare someone who didn’t give a hoot what you thought about him, plain and simple. He was a dirty old man whose sardonic rants ran rank, slippery with booze, and often trickled over into the obscene and pornographic. He bedded women for the hell of it; underestimating the euphoric state of fleeting groupie pleasure, and had the audacity to laugh in their faces afterwards. Well, if that’s what you think Charles Bukowski is all about, you’d be dead wrong.

In this beautifully edited postmortem documentary, the outspoken artist’s vulnerability is on full display; shocking at best. He openly weeps, squawks and paws at his audience still. Shot in installments over the course of 30 some-odd years, his life, obsessions and empathy become commonplace to us, as it is brilliantly shuffled and shared. And of course it’s easy to misinterpret his talent and personality. To deny axiom for legend. It isn’t purely our fault; as human beings strive to count and categorize, but more importantly, Charles Bukowski didn’t want everyone to see that side of him. That side would confuse and infuriate. The society he wrote about, the society that prodded and ostracized him would then be his demise. That’s something that neither he nor his fans could ever accept. That is why we don’t blame him for constructing such a façade, when the method to his madness may have kept him alive for much longer than anyone else expected.

Struggling through his early years with routine spankings and acne vulgaris, it’s no wonder Bukowski was a sullen mixture of obedience and defiance. Unpredictable to say the least, he knew that in order to achieve his highest goals, he needed to give in a little. Anyone who read Post Office could easily proffer that his imagination stretched remarkably, but the tale was actually based on fact. The uniquely talented author spent nearly twelve years strapped to the murderous circuity of monotonous clerk and carrier. But his friends knew he was clever; it was in fact, his way of beating the game while in it. They knew he had figured out a way to pay the rent while downtime was spent creating and sending off mass mailings of his work (originals, no carbons) to various nobody magazines and publishing houses. That, and perhaps noone else would hire him.

Rejection was no stranger to Bukowski, but he never gave up and never compromised. His diligence formed a kind of solitary reward, an almost pleasure center. So when fame came, he was already prepared in a way, stating everything (fame, money and “the blondes with the tight pussies”) came too late. But they did come, and now we can enjoy his statements in broad print, appreciate his guttural honesty and devotion to his art. Thanks to this documentary, we (old fans and newcomers alike) can retrospectively revere his beauty, which few accepted him for when he was alive.

 

I’ll leave you with my very favourite Buk poem, which was featured in the movie and speaks for itself:

BLUEBIRD
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say, stay in there, I'm not going
to let anybody see
you.
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I pour whiskey on him and inhale
cigarette smoke
and the whores and the bartenders
and the grocery clerks
never know that
he's
in there.
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say,
stay down, do you want to mess
me up?
you want to screw up the
works?
you want to blow my book sales in
Europe?
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too clever, I only let him out
at night sometimes
when everybody's asleep.
I say, I know that you're there,
so don't be
sad.
then I put him back,
but he's singing a little
in there, I haven't quite let him
die
and we sleep together like
that
with our
secret pact
and it's nice enough to
make a man
weep, but I don't
weep, do
you?

-----------------

PLAYDATES:
MAY 28th, 2004
LOS ANGELES, CA at Landmark's Nuart Theatre
CAMBRIDGE, MA at Landmark's Kendall Square Cinema
BERKELEY, CA at Landmark's Act 1 & 2 Cinemas
SAN FRANCISCO, CA at Landmark's Lumiere Theatre
IRVINE, CA at Regal's University Town Centre
JUNE 4th, 2004
NEW YORK, NY at the Cinema Village Triplex

JUNE 11th, 2004
PORTLAND, OR at Cinema 21
LONG BEACH, CA at the Art Theatre

JUNE 18th, 2004
ATLANTA, GA at Landmark's Midtown Art Cinema
MINNEAPOLIS, MN at Landmark's Lagoon Cinema
JULY 9th, 2004
WASHINGTON, DC at Landmark's E Street Cinema
CHICAGO, IL at the Music Box Theatre
SANTA BARBARA, CA at the University of California (UCSB)

JULY 16th, 2004
TUCSON, AZ at The Loft

JULY 30th, 2004
ST LOUIS, MO at Landmark's Tivoli Theatre
SEATTLE, WA at Landmark's Varsity Theatre

AUGUST 6th, 2004
SAN DIEGO, CA at Landmark's Ken Cinema

AUGUST 20th, 2004
OKLAHOMA CITY, OK at the Noble Theatre

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

KRIS KOBAYASHI 

 

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