Bukowski: Born into This (2003)

User Rating:

7.8/10   

Director:

John Dullaghan

Release Date:

30 April 2004 (UK)

Genre:

Documentary | Biography

Plot:

Documentary on Charles Bukowski, author of 'Notes of a Dirty Old Man', 'Love Is a Dog from Hell', and the autobiographical novels, 'Women', 'Hollywood', and 'Post Office'. |

Plot Keywords:

Directorial Debut | Husband Wife Relationship | Poetry Reading | Photograph | Memories

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

Charles Bukowski	...	Himself (archive footage)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Bono	...	Himself
John Bryan	...	Himself
Linda Lee Bukowski	...	Herself
Marina Bukowski	...	Herself
Michael Cano	...	Himself
Neeli Cherkovski	...	Herself
Joyce Fante	...	Herself
FrancEye	...	Herself
Taylor Hackford	...	Himself
John Martin	...	Himself
Mike Meloan	...	Himself
Jack Micheline	...	Himself
Pam 'Cupcakes' Miller	...	Herself
Dom Muto	...	Himself
William Packard	...	Himself
Sean Penn	...	Himself
Steve Richmond	...	Himself
Barbet Schroeder	...	Himself
Harry Dean Stanton	...	Himself
Tom Waits	...	Himself
Carl Weissner	...	Himself
Liza Williams	...	Herself

Directed by
John Dullaghan

Produced by
Diane Markow	....	co-producer
John McCormick	....	co-producer

Original Music by
James Stemple		(as James Wesley Stemple)

Cinematography by
Matt Mindlin
Art Simon

Film Editing by
Victor Livingston

Sound Department
Richard Burton	....	sound re-recording mixer
Gary Gossett	....	sound
Paul Hackner	....	sound
Ted Sheibar	....	additional sound engineer
David Silberberg	....	sound

Music Department
Charlie Paakkari	....	music editor

Distributors

• Magnolia Home Entertainment
• Magnolia Pictures (2004) (USA)
• Pretty Pictures (2005) (France) (theatrical)
• Zazie Films (2005) (Japan) (theatrical)

MPAA:

Rated R for language and sexual content/nudity.

Runtime:

130 min | Japan:113 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

USA:R | Australia:MA

Trivia:

The title of the film comes from Bukowski's poem, "Dinosauria, we", which was published in his book, "The Last Night Of The Earth Poems". Published in 1992, it was the final book of poetry released while the poet was still alive.

Movie Connections:

Edited from The Charles Bukowski Tapes (1985)

Here's to Buk, here's to Dullaghan

Nothing explains Bukowski like Bukowski himself, and that's why this film works. This memoir keeps his voice at the center, alongside some tough minded commentary by his wife Linda Lee Bukowski and his publisher John Martin at Black Sparrow Press. His daughter Marina also appears briefly,as do a number of his former girlfriends. As a long time admirer of his cleanness of line on the page,and contempt for long winded abstraction in poetry, I think this film of John Dullaghan's rings true as a work convinced of the worthiness of its subject. Bukowski was one of the best poets of the 20th century, though if you troll through the much esteemed halls of poetry even now, you'll see the same pretentious farts scoring him downward. That's the way of it. Bukowski was his own poet, his own voice, his own reference. What a hustle, What a game. Here's to Bukowski, here's to Director John Dullaghan. Let the spoonfed tend to the spoonfed.