Howl - Gay Life Among the Beats in the 1950s

[uwsman2]

I suspect this is just playing in a few cities, but I urge anybody who can get to a theater that is showing "Howl" to hurry right out and see it. This is totally brilliant film-making, with special significance for a gay male audience, because it is the story of one man's struggle during the 1950s - the age of the deep, deep closet - to work through his own identity and emerge triumphant as an ecstatic gay man who then took the very bold step - for that time - of expressing all this in a poem that he read publicly and then had published - leading to a great obscenity trial.

 

James Franco plays Allen Ginsberg in the film with a sense of realism and deep engagement that is totally captivating. And although the actor has said that he is not gay, he seems to specialize in playing gay roles and comes across in his recent Advocate cover-story interview as totally comfortable with working with gay people, socializing with gay people - - and not bothered that rumors about him being gay continue to circulate. (It's just a bit uncomfortable for his girlfriend, that's all...) Well, I'd do him in a NY minute!

 

Lots of other cuties and hoties on the screen as well, but that's not really the point. This one is mainly for the mind - and it's a very inventive production by our leading gay creative cinematic team - Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman.

[Guest alanm]

The following is my posting here on 7-11-2020 about "Howl." I did not copy the last few lines, because I moved on to comment about gay and lesbian film festivals:

 

 

I saw "Howl" on Friday [July 9] night. The poem is still powerful and shocking even today. But, many people have said that Ginsberg was such a force of life when he read the poem aloud, people really listened and loved what they heard. James Franco (Ginsberg) reads much of the poem to an enthusiastic audience in SF in the film. His words are often in the background as very good animation tries to make sense of the poem. Good idea.

 

"Howl" is also a court room drama based on the 1957 obscenity trial. Even with Jon Hamm as the lawyer for the defense (the publisher of "Howl"), the trial scenes were the least effective part of the movie for me.

 

Franco (as Ginsberg, circa 1957) often speaks directly to the audience about his eight months in a mental hospital and his relationships with Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassidy and his long-time partner, Peter Orlovsky. All three men are played by handsome and charmimg actors, especially Aaron Tveit, who is almost naked in one scene, as Orlovsky. I wanted to see more of these relationships, which seems reasonable since the film runs for only 90 minutes.

 

Tviet is a Broadway ("Next to Normal") and TV actor ("Gossip Girl").