Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

Perfectly adorable

Crappy film

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

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.

Regardless the fact that Mickey Rourke is a great actor in my opinion and appreciate his acting in many movies, he was just not the right person to be in this movie.. If you know nothing about the writer and the lead character of the movie, Charles Bukowski you may like the performance of the actor and praise him. There is a scene in the movie where Charles Bukowski himself sits in the bar drinking his beer and smoking his cigarette staring at his silhouette.. In that scene it is obvious that the movie needed someone more heavy and charismatic at least as much as that man sitting in the bar... Actors should be the exaggerated forms of real people. So it is not a surprise of Charles Bukowski's condemnation of Mickey Rourke's portrayal of him (Chinaski) in the movie.

'I don't know where the whores are going, where the black pimps are going, where music is going but my idea in life is that where the black pimps are, where the pimps are, where the music is playing, where the lights are on, that's where life is....I think degradation, black pimps, prostitution are the flowers of the Earth.' Bukowski used to say. Grandma Moses,the old murderer, the drinkers at the Golden Horn, Wanda, Henry those are representatives of the world in which Charles Bukowski used to live in Los Angeles, California. It's a kind of subterranean life, not most of us are aware of. Barfly is a semi-autobiography of C. Bukowski, the script was written by the poet. M. Rourke is brilliant here. He had to study Bukowski from He used The Charles Bukowski Tapes, a documentary directed by the same Barbet Schroeder, to analyze the writer's gestures and intonation. Just like in Arizona Dreaming, Faye Dunaway gives a wonderful performance as Wanda Wilcox.Overall, Barfly is a wonderful study of bohemian life. If ' Days of Wine and Roses','The Last Weekend', 'Leaving Las Vegas' show the dark aspects of alcoholism, the seriousness of it,Schroeder looks at the issue without prejudices. You will enjoy the movie, especially if you are into Charles Bukowski's short stories and poems.

I saw Barfly when it was first out not knowing anything about Charles Bukowski. After reading Bukowski and watching him recite some of his work on You-Tube, I gained a renewed appreciation for Mickey's portrayal of Bukowski. He talks like him, acts like him and demonstrates the values of Bukowski. Maybe his best role ever. A truly artful movie - you can almost smell the bar smell - and Bukowski. You can feel the view Bukowski has for the world around him. I'm glad he was able to achieve some of the notoriety in his life before he passed in 1994. This movie is a glimpse into the lifestyle of bar-life and of a man who lived in, knew well and wrote about the underbelly of that life. I can't think of anyone else who could have done a better job than Mickey. Mat Dillon tried in Factotem but he's too pretty to be Bukowski.