Barfly (1987)

Simply A Masterpiece

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

If Martin Scorsese directed a movie in slow motion and dirtied it up a little more, he'd get the ultimate foray into a humans bout with alcoholism. So here, I give you the little seen gem from 1987, Barfly.Mickey Rourke in the title role, takes method acting to a whole new level. I'm not sure what happened between takes, but I feel that he might have stayed in character, didn't shower, probably wore the same clothes, and went by the name of his lead, Henry Chinaski. He drinks like a fish, inhabits the slumming L.A. bars, and gets into fights with a bartender named Eddie (played effectively by Sly Stallone's brother, Frank Stallone). When he's not fighting, failing to pay his rent, and aspiring to be a writer, he gets the attention of a beautiful older woman (another drunk played by Faye Dunaway as Wanda Wilcox). They form an interesting relationship that anchors a large majority of what's on screen. As they wallow in their drunkenness, Henry is pursued by a detective and a women news writer who wants to publish one of his stories.Almost feeling like a film told in a dreamlike state, Barfly is a character study that revels in irony and self-loathing. It's dirty, free forming, and harbors grubby, all too realistic performances. The side characters are people who you'd find in an alley and kinda look like homeless vagabonds. This is truly Los Angeles at its most depressing and most hideous. The script is based on the writings and life of the famed novelist Charles Bukowski. And the short running time sort of ends and begins in the same exact way. There are some quotable lines, an honest, demented take on the concept of dying, and a cameo by the screenwriter and novelist himself.Ultimately, it's Rourke's shining moment and Barfly succeeds because of him and almost nothing else. During the first half of the proceedings, his inebriated Henry utters the line, "don't worry, no one's loved me yet." Well this critic loved Mickey's realistic, balls out performance. Forget his Oscar nominated turn in The Wrestler. This is "bar" none, his best work.

Somehow this film stuck in the back of my head as something really good I had seen in the 80's and when I had the chance to see it again I jumped at the chance. Oh dear. I never made the connection between "Barfly" and Charles Bukowski's writings, which I read 10 years later, and there's a good reason why. This is awful and untrue to the writing. Mickey Rourke seems to have based his acting on cartoon characters. Foghorn Leghorn for the physical acting and Sylvester the cat with a touch of WC Fields for speaking. He could do no wrong at the time, who was going to tell him otherwise? Set in a different time period from the writings it misses a chance to draw comparisons between those lost to society post-Great depression and their hugely similar post-Reagan counterparts. Bukowski had "Don't try" written on his gravestone, a phrase from one of his poems. Obviously everyone involved in this film read that poem. Watch "Factotum".

This is one of those rare films that really captures "The down and out!" But, really you're down and out IF you ARE down and out!....Barfly shows the reality of some lives...Wake up..Drink...Drink all day...Drink all night...Drink right before you sleep...and start all over again the next day...I know people that are like each of the characters in this movie...I LOVE THIS FILM!!! truly as real as it gets! Maybe not the fighting all the time?..Could happen like that..But, the drunks I know...Really are too drunk all the time to raise a fist except to summon the barkeeper.....and even then, that sometimes is too much!!....But, everyone's story is different!....For some reason I can watch this film again and again...maybe it's the Jerri springer factor?... You know seeing others worse than yourself?....Either way...a MUST see!!! Rourke is awesome in this one...As usual!!!

Rourke was and is one of the most unusual talents in modern movies. I saw him first in Rumble Fish and was hooked - and later in Barfly.The movie is tragic - and magic. It appeals to the sense of the dreamer in all of us - limited only by our ability or inability to loose the bonds of self-imposed craving, addiction - "that which we can't do without" - whatever that may be.Faye Dunaway is just beautiful in Barfly and the relationship between Dunaway and Rourke is one of the great unsung romantic partnerships on screen. Imagine if you will if Rhett Butler hit the bottle in his late forties and Scarlet suddenly twigged that she couldn't have kids and gin tasted better anyway - it would look like Rourke and Dunaway! Its been years since I saw the movie but the memory of it is never far away and its about time I bought a copy. If you've seen Rourke in Sin City you're just not getting the full picture of one of the most gifted, badly managed actors in the business. The nineties should have belonged to Rourke.Enjoy.