Three 'Bukowskian' torrid nights in the life of a man in search of love. Harry Voss, 12, is young and naive. Love, for him, is romantic love between princes and princesses demurely kissing each other on the mouth. His father is a hero who kidnapped his mother and married her on a lonely mountain peak... Later on, he'll do the same. But Harry has a lot to learn. He learns about 'being hot' and 'fucking' and about what you have to do when you're alone and 'feel the itch'. He also learns that there are handsome men and ugly ones, that love can be unfair. That one can find comfort in drinking... but above all he learns that man is capable of anything - absolutely anything! - to get his fair share of love.
Reviews
crazy love, i saw this movie In my teens and it really affected me emotionally, it is a sad movie acted well, and I'm a huge bukowski fan, this movie often gets looked over, i think in tone it is actually one of the best adaptations of any of his work, especially the third act. (love is a dog from hell) the original title. deals with the material spot on. i have told a lot of my friends about it,but it seems very hard to find, if your a charles bukowski fan, i think this film is a must see. be warned though this movie is for adults only, as the material is pretty extreme. beautiful, ugly, satisfying movie. if you cant find a DVD copy, check your TV guides in Australia as you maybe lucky like me and see it on sbs TV
this movie really has nothing to do with bukowski. there is the terrible acne, the yearning for love, and the alcoholism. other than that, when writer has made everything his own, and the people releasing this film should have billed it as "inspired by charles bukowski" not based of the poems of.it is told in 3 sections, and while the fist two sections are beautifully acted by the two boys/men playing "henry voss" (must not have gotten the rights to play henry chinaski), the 3rd and worst section is played by an actor trying to recreate Mickey Rourke in "Barlfy," only the make-up artists made him up to look even greasier. throw in masturbation with a 12 year old boy, a direct "elephant man" allusion, and an ending that makes one want to throw up, and you have a combination of ingredients that would make bukowski punch someone in the jaw. only i didn't even get that: i felt deflated and cheated. as a fan of bukowski's work, at arm's length, this is purely garbage.but i did get a kick out of thinking that it is possibly johnny depp playing guitar in the prom scene (which in bukowski's poem, he only looks through the window and observes, why the director decided to fictionalize this, i don't understand).rent this if you're a huge bukowski fan ready to be let down hard. it's in the same category of fante's "ask the dust" adaptation, about a struggling Italian writer in his teens, played by collin farrel.
This movie shows the life of Harry Voss, from being a child with a romantic vision of the world to becoming a frustrated alcoholic. Only the third part is based on the short story "The copulating mermaid of Venice, California" by Charles Bukowski. But its development is so intense that it required two other chapters in order to make it even more meaningful. It mixes nice and entertaining images with black, depressing scenes and the end might not be everybody's taste. As one of the songs of the movie puts it, love hurts but it can also kill. Although the film can be funny at times it is mainly sad and it will not leave any spectator indifferent.
Loosely based on the writings of Charles Bukowski,the first segment is actually based on a couple of paragraphs from a short story by John Fante,Bukowski's favorite writer. Director Dominique Deruddere has let his imagination run wild,so what the audience ends up with is a vision of Bukowski living John Fante's childhood, in the European countryside.Gene Bervoets looks very much like Buk's description of himself in "Ham on Rye" and other writings.The soundtrack is great.An interesting coming of age tale.