Barfly

Arrived in a timely manner. Product was as promised, worked well with my new DVD player and was in English!

This movie is great - it's like a running soundtrack to Tom Wait's "Heart of Saturday Night" album as written and directed by Charles Bukowski. This movie has a bit of a 'Big Lebowski' feel to it, though the movies are nothing alike.Some highlights include:- Frank Stallone as the masculine 'pretty boy' bartender in a dive bar- Frank Stallone and Mickey Rourke absolutely hating on each other- Sandy Martin- Faye Dunaway as Rourke's crazy drunk love interest. Their dynamic is entertaining- Dunaway and Rourke's living arrangements/neighbors- seeing a billboard for Spaceballs- seeing the LA area in that era and how different it's becomeThis is a fun movie to watch, especially with a drink - it helps you understand and appreciate the mood of it all.

Charles Bukowski was undoubtedly one of the greatest writers of the 20th century. He was a bum who lived on the streets of LA. The main character of this movie is Henry Chinaski, who is Bukowski's alter ego and is the main character of his works. Faye Dunaway is his love interest in this bizarre take on the Days of Wine and Roses. Not for everyone but it is an interesting peek into the lives of the homeless and into the mind of Charles Bukowski.

I admit it took me a few tries to get through this movie. Perhaps because I never saw Fay Dunaway looking so street hungry and drawn out and not her usual glamorous self. But the movie does develope a plot, and there is a lessen is to be learned. I ended up watching it several times in a row. It does seem to end a little bit abruptly as by that time you want more story development. A sequel would have been in order.

The DVD arrived very fast. We have watched it with no issues. Great quality. Would buy from this seller again.

My DVD was from Korea. Why it is so hard to find is beyond me. The DVD works, and has Close Caption in English. My DVD player plays all regions.I like the movie when I rented it 25 years ago, saw it again on Netflix and would have stream purchased it, but it’s not available. I live in a mining town so I have seen & known barflys.

Charles Bukowski was a poet, writer and alcoholic. Mickey Rourke gives a wonderful performance playing him in BARFLY. I ordered it because scenes were actually filmed at the Kenmore Bar on 3rd Street in Los Angeles. One of my favorite hangouts. The intro shows exteriors of many Hollywood Bars, that no longer exist. Hollywood memories sure hurt us Senior citizens who lived in early Hollywood. Things change don't they? THE SIDESHOW is one, bar front, shown at the opening credits. It was near the Paramount theater, now named the El Capitan, across from Grauman's. When I first moved to Hollywood, I lived above The Sideshow Bar at Hollywood and Highland. It was the Park Hotel and now it is a Hostel for tourists, reopened after more than 20 years of being closed. Hollywood Bars in the late 50's early 60's, resembled home town bars across the country. All gone now. So when you watch BARFLY it was in this era that is now gone. I am too old to cry and so sad in remembering them as well as the many who had been regular customers and are now six feet under. Someone should write a book and I think Bukowski did write one.Get this one on Amazon before it is sold out for good.

Mickey Rourke is fabulously entertaining in this movie, playing a fictionalized Charles Bukowski who hangs out in bars, gets drunk, gets in fights, and scribbles verse in his SRO apartment—when he's "discovered" by a literary journal.For those of us old enough to remember, Rourke came on the scene as a handsome young man, charming us in The Pope of Greenwich Village and hitting it big in 9 1/2 Weeks. In his more recent work in The Wrestler, Sin City and Iron Man 2, he's a different man—an actor who's lived a hard life. I won't get into the biography. I will stay that in Barfly, Rourke is still that young charmer but he seems to be channeling his older self—raw, reckless, with a dose of attitude for anyone who butts into his way. Rourke has a fascinating career, demonstrating a lot of versatility, playing hoods, lawyers, villains, heroes...but this role is unique, as is this movie.Faye Dunaway is terrific as well, showing the edge and flair we saw in Chinatown.Look, there is a lot of drinking in this movie. These are people living on the dive end of life. But they have their hope and dignity. And this movie is made with love.

Good at last to get hold of Barfly which has proved difficult to track down on DVD. This one is an import copy but no worries as the film plays fine in English. The cover is a little deceptive as seems to suggest a steamy love affair like nine and a half weeks which Rourke also starred in. But those who love the film know it better as the loose biographical account of writer Charles Bukowski's life as both drunken street-philosopher and aspiring writer. Scripted by Bukowski (with a very small cameo sitting at a bar) the film builds on the myth of Buk/Chinaski as a hard-drinking layabout who just happens to get into print, soon to become a cult within the underground literary scene.It probably helps to know something about Bukowski to get on with the film's gritty outlook. This is not typical Hollywood as it portrays the seedy, underbelly of American/Capitalist life. The redeeming factor is the cruel humour that runs through the film despite the poverty, the seeming hopelessness and the occasional violence. This is what Buk saw as being the truth of human life, the kind he translated into his poems and stories, and the film does manage to capture the flavour of his work.Barfly is perhaps best described as an arthouse film that stands up well to repeated plays. Rourke's portrayal of Bukowski is somewhat grotesque and overdone (Buk in real life looked after his appearance and wasn't as scruffy as Rourke's character). What carries the film along is the scathing observations of modern life that Bukowski is famed for. Funny and sad, but never obvious.

The film is fine. What is irritating is that there is no way of getting rid of the subtitles which are in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian and Finnish. They distract and especially to me as I can more or less read Scandiwegian. There is no indication in the product description that you have to have the subtitles on all the time. it seems to me to be a minimum to allow the viewer to turn the subtitles off.

It was in a foreign language without subtitles ?

Couldn't watch it as dialogue was in Dutch & couldn't change it to English. No mention of this when I ordered it.

A great film that captures Bukowski perfectly. Such performances...