The Source

They were called the Beatniks.The Source (1999) tells how Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac met at Columbia University in 1944, and started an era of the Beats then.Many others joined the group, like William S. Burroughs.Kerouac died in 1969, Ginsberg and Burroughs in 1997.There are three famous actors playing these three and speak the words of these geniuses.The legendary Dennis Hopper is Burroughs.The brilliant John Turturro is Ginsberg.And Johnny Depp, who's only the hottest actor today, is Kerouac.There are some great people talking about the Beat movement and seen in archive footage, like Steve Allen, Amiri Baraka, Lenny Bruce, Walter Cronkite, Bob Dylan, Jerry Garcia, Philip Glass, Billie Holiday, Bob Hope, Robert F. Kennedy, Ken Kesey, Martin Luther King, John Leguizamo, Norman Mailer, Steve Martin, Groucho Marx and Henry Rollins.There's a clip from Happy Days with Tom Bosley, Marion Ross and Ron Howard discussing about the whole Beat thing at the table.The Source is a fascinating documentary.It's also very educational telling you everything you ever wanted to know about the topic.So all of you that have some interest for the Beat, open your eyes and watch The Source.

The Source was the first documentary I have ever seen on the big screen beside those huge IMax films. The Source was very enjoyable film. I have always read Kerouac and Burroughs with much enthusiasm and this film helped me to fall in love with their work all over again and some more. The Beats were an aquired taste, but if you are searching for yourself (and I believe most people are) these guys can help you start. They don't show you the way but they give you a good start.

This film was very insightful into the lives of these life searching nomads. See this if you enjoy their work. Even if you never read any of their stuff, see it anyway.

The best (and seemingly only coherent) documentary on the Beat Generation and their affect on the world and modern literature. Its strength lies in the great plundering of archive material that doesn't restrict itself to the usual photos and clips. All three actors deliver amazing performances during the readings (esp. Dennis Hopper as Burroughs).

8/10!

Chuck Workman did a fantastic job recreating the beat generation, via old footage, and vignettes involving Johnny Depp as Jack Kerouac, and Dennis Hopper as William Burroughs. This is truly a "must see" little gem of a film.

The Source takes some priceless footage of this country's seminal beat poets and traces their impact on our society over 5 generations, from the 50's up through present time. Back in the 40's a young football player named Jack Kerouac at Columbia College in New York broke his leg and spent some time talking with other intellectuals, befriending one spindly young lad named Allen Ginsberg. Eventually they met up with another fellow named William S. Burroughs. From this small kernal sprang a movement that begat or aided in the progress of other movements throughout the past 50 years.

Piecing together footage from home movies, interviews, TV shows, films, and many other sources, Workman has built a very effective argument for this thesis: young intellectuals sharing thoughts about humankind's existence and our reason for being. It was right after the atomic bomb had been dropped. Film noir reflected the country's fears and anxieties. The world was no longer what it seemed. Existentialism and intellectualism were entering a new phase in society, and a group of free thinkers were born. Kerouac published a book which gave this group a name - "beats." Thus the beatnik was born. Gone. Crazy. Hip. Far out. Anything that questioned authority or existence, whether art, music, poetry, writing, performance...anything.

Strangers in their own country, these restless explorers were considered too weird for maintstream society, and were largely ignored or shunned. Eventually beatniks were accepted for what they were, evolving into "hippies." The movements of the 60's gave us "special interest groups" - gay & lesbian groups, the feminist movement, and others that owe a debt of gratitude to the free thinking beats.