Bukowski: Born into this

Utilizing a mix of affection and critical distance, BUKOWSKI; BORN INTO THIS traces his unhappy childhood through his psychiatric exemption during World War II to odd jobbing across the country throughout the 1940s. Finally settling in L.A. he worked many detested years at the post office while trying to become a writer. During this time he was soaking up the "experience" that would dominate his books to come: Epic alcohol benders, barroom fisticuffs, screaming fights with a series of trashy here-today, gone-tomorrow girlfriends. His ranting column in the L.A. Free Press, "Notes of a Dirty Old Man" turned middle-aged, plug-ugly “Hank” into a 1960s counterculture hit. Novels, memoirs and poetry collections soon poured out of him, much expanding his readership. And he became a fringe-celebrity magnet for groupie girls at the height of the Sexual Revolution, which he took full advantage of as "research" for an eventual novel called "Women." Ultimately, he settled down into comparatively normal (yet still very boozy) domestic life with much younger spouse Linda. He died of leukemia in 1994, at age 74. Considered a temperamental crank, the film also captures glimpses of a secret softie and makes a compelling case for Bukowski as one of the great American writers of the late 20th Century.