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Starring
Mickey Rourke, Faye Dunaway, Alice Krige

Director
Barbet Schroeder

Year
1987

Genre
Drama

Synopsis
In this darkly funny film written by American poet Charles Bukowski, based on his own experiences, Mickey Rourke stars as Henry Chinaski, a poet and alcoholic who spends his life in bars in Los Angeles, drinking every night.

Henry meets and falls in love with Wanda (Oscar-winner Faye Dunaway) who is also an alcoholic, but Henry is still able to see the beauty Wanda once was before she started to drink. Together they meet Tully (Alice Krige) who decides to publish Henry's poems and for a short time he becomes famous but in the end it is clear that Henry and Wanda have only one goal in life.

Trivia: unbeknown to the filmmakers the apartment building where Wanda's apartment was located was an actual building where Charles Bukowski and his lover had lived; Charles Bukowski wanted Sean Penn for the lead, Penn insisted on Dennis Hopper to direct, Bukowski had written the screenplay for Schroeder and would not surrender it to Hopper, whom he despised as "a gold-chain-wearing Hollywood phoney"; the film was shot using authentic locations around Los Angeles. Cameo: Charles Bukowski in the bar where Henry and Wanda meet for the first time.

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