So Much Better Than Bukowski
At the risk of having my hipster credentials revoked, I've got a confession to make: I'm not a fan of Charles Bukowski. In all fairness I'm compelled to admit that I've only read two works by him, Post Office and Women.
This isn't meant to be a wholesale dismissal of Bukowski's work. Rather, I think it's about time we acknowledged the writer who is arguably the master of this branch of the west coast "social realist" genre, namely John Fante. Don't take my word for it - just refer to Bukowski, who named Fante as his primary inspiration and the reason for his career as a writer.
Now comes word that none other than the brilliant Robert Towne has adapted Fante's "Ask The Dust" for the big screen. Mr. Towne's screenwriting credits are the stuff of legend: Chinatown (for which he won an Oscar), Bonnie and Clyde, Shampoo, The Last Detail, and the vastly under rated The Parallax View, to name just a few.
Towne has written and directed a screen-adaptation of Fante's tremendous "Ask The Dust," the hard-scrabble story of Depression-era Los Angeles. The main protagonist is Fante's go-to guy and everyman alter-ego Arturo Bandini, a first-generation Italian-American who falls in love with the beautiful Mexican Camilla.
As in many of Fante's works, the characters find themselves held in the untenable choice of love verses comfort. It's an economical work of genius which deserves a much larger audience.
It's hard to know how Colin Farrell and Selma Hayek will manage to sell Arturo and Camilla, but Towne has a history of balancing large social issues with personal dynamic. At the very least the film deserves a viewing.
For more on Fante, check out this great piece in Salon, or go here.
For more on the film adaptation of "Ask The Dust," go here.
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Comments
Posted by: rick rizzo | March 12, 2006 05:59 PM
I have a hard time seeing how a movie adaptation can avoid failure, but if anyone can do it, I think Robert Towne's the guy. The problem with such stories is that they're limited by the front-loading of shared cultural knowledge. Is there anyone out there who doesn't know ahead of time the nature of the dynamics involved?
This is precisely the problem I have with "Walk The Line." While I'll agree that the performances were very good, and the subject matter (like "Ray") is a bit of s slam-dunk, we've seen this tale flashed up on the cave wall in shadow-form since Plato wore a toga.
The bio-pic, of course, suffers from a much different constraint, as the writer(s) and actors can only work against reality. It just seems to me that film often gets this sort of thing wrong, which I suppose is your point.
Having said all that, I have entertained a fantasy for years - to make a low-budget movie-adaptation of "A Bottle of Milk for Mother" and "The Devil Came Down Division Street."
Posted by: Dave Roth | March 12, 2006 06:54 PM
Posted by: David Roth | March 12, 2006 08:15 PM