Wednesday, February 4, 2015

Film Screening: Burroughs The Movie


Burroughs in New York in the 1970's.  Punk meets the counter culture conscious mind.

Liberty Hall is showing the digitally restored Burroughs: The Movie on Thursday at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m..  The movie is currently being distributed for worldwide screenings through Janus Films.

Capturing a 1970's Burroughs, documentary film director Howard Brookner shows Burroughs when he was on a wave of influence on New York artists, musicians and writers.  The film contains interviews with NYC contemporaries Allen Ginsberg, Terry Southern, and Patti Smith.

Burroughs is candid about his controversial personal life in the film.  We see a personal life that is shattered;  Burrouhgs shot his wife and killed her, and his relationship with his only son is fragile. 

Roger Ebert writes in a June 1984 review of the movie: ;The most painful passages in the film deal with his son, Willie Jr., an alcoholic and speed freak – “the last of the beatniks” – who wrote a couple of books and then committed suicide during the filming. Father and son are awkward together; although they are both anti-establishment rebels, it gives them nothing in common.

Burroughs: The Movie will be added to The Criterion Collection.

More information about the screening at Liberty Hall can be found herehttp://www. Lawrence.com/events/2015/feb/05/burroughs-movie/?et=85483

More Burroughs: 
 This American life has a nifty take on Burroughs in their recent podcast Burroughs 101. Iggy Pop narrates.  Listen to Burroughs 101 from This American Life Here: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/546/burroughs-101



Photo via Maggie Allen

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