Factotum

[kotte]

Trailer .

Cast: Matt Dillon, Marisa Tomei, Lili Taylor

Director: Bent Hamer

Screenwriter: Charles Bukowski and Bent Hamer

Premise: This drama centers on a jack-of-all-trades who wanders around Los Angeles trying to live off jobs which don't interfere with his primary interests - women, drinking, gambling and writing.

[kotte]

This is a quite beautiful film with terrific performances by all involved. Dillon impressed.

And got some of the best music I've heard in a movie for a long time.

[Ghostboy]

I just saw the trailer for this yesterday - I had no idea it was even being made. It looks great. This was the first Bukowski novel I read, and it looks like a pretty decent adaptation.

What music is in it?

[kotte]

What music is in it?

Y'know, this is crap. I can't remember and it doesn't say on imdb. I guess I have to do some googleing.

[kotte]

Ghostboy...

The feeling I got from Chinaski is that the journey he makes is one of a tortured writer. That's what made me like this film so much and wanna read the book.

I know Chinaski is Bukowski's alter-ego but how much of the book is about that feeling? Or is it just a drunk losing jobs and women?

[Ghostboy]

Or is it just a drunk losing jobs and women?

That's pretty much the book. You do get the sense of him being a writer...a failed writer, that is...but it isn't as prevalent as even the trailer for the film made it out to be. Of course, since you know it's Bukowski writing loosely about himself, you can intuit a lot into the little bits he does include about sending off short stories.

[cron]

"...maybe death is giving me some signs? The other day I was thinking about the world without me. There is the world going on doing what it does. And I'm not there. Very odd. Think of the garbage truck coming by and picking up the garbage and I'm not there. Or the newspaper sits in the drive and I'm not there to pick it up. Impossible. And worse, some time after I'm dead, I'm going to be truly discovered. All those who were afraid of me or hated me when I was alive will suddenly embrace me. My words will be everywhere. Clubs and societies will be formed. It will be sickening. A movie will be made of my life. I will be made a much more courageous and talented man than I am. Much more. It will be enough to make the gods puke. The human race exaggerates everything: its heroes, its enemies, its importance. The fuckers. There, I feel better. God-damned human race. There, I feel better. The night is cooling off."

-him

[kotte]

Yeah, that's funny...

[kotte]

A Bukowski poem...


So You Want To Be a Writer?

if it doesn't come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or
fame,
don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,
don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody
else
forget about it.

if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you
then wait patiently.
if it never roar out of you,
do seomthing else.
if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you're not ready.

don't be like so many writers
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.

when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.

[Pubrick]

and yet flagpolespecial will continue to write..

[GoneSavage]

Is this better than Barfly?  I for one do not want to see Matt Dillon portraying Hank.

[hedwig]

Is this better than Barfly?  I for one do not want to see Matt Dillon portraying Hank.

who would you want to see portray him

[cron]

ron perlman/ no one

[GoneSavage]

I think Mickey Rourke did a fine job.

[Redlum]

This is one of my favourite films this year. Definately in the top five at the moment.

The music is beautiful. It took me ages to find but the song in the trailer is "Slow Day" by Dadafon who also did the rest of the score and the lyrics were from a poem I beleive. They're a hard to find norwegian band, their CDs arent even on Amazon but I managed to get it from limewire. If you dont have any luck, let me know and I'll email it.