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PLOT: Drinking, sex, several dead-end jobs and the relentless need to write about it all. Based on the second novel by Charles Bukowski, and it's entirely watchable. Well, for Bukowski fans, any way.
Henry gets up in the morning, vomits heavily, lights a cigarette. Jan gets up, vomits in a vaguely more feminine fashion and likewise lights up.
Ah, that first smoke of the day. The whole world has a hangover in Charles Bukowski's universe.
Factotum, based on Bukowski's autobiographical novel of life lived waaaaay out there, stars Matt Dillon as Henry and Lili Taylor as Jan, one of the women more or less in Henry's life.
As the movie explains, a factotum is an employee who can do all kinds of jobs. Factotum is an account of some of the work Bukowski took on to pay the bar bills while he struggled to get published.
His job at an ice factory ends when he makes his first delivery to a local tavern. He decides to stay a while. He doesn't get hired on as a cab driver once the drunk-driving convictions become known. There's a stint at a pickle factory, a brief sojourn at a bicycle supply warehouse, a cleaning job. Something. Nothing. Something. He always gets fired. In between there's an ocean of alcohol, lots of sex, a few trips to the horse races and writing, writing, writing.
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Everything about Factotum has a thin film of grime on it and a gritty residue under the corners. Lit and photographed as if to reflect the empty grey stretches between drinks, the film has an overall flat affect that extends to the performances -- although we mean that in the best sort of low-key way.
The cast includes Fisher Stevens, Marisa Tomei, Didier Flamand and the late Adrienne Shelly, all of whom get to nod at the absurdities of everyday life in an attractive, deadpan fashion.
As Henry, Bukowski's alter ego, Matt Dillon is just about perfect -- a quiet, world-weary, dignified writer and alcoholic.
Filmmaker Bent Hamer (Kitchen Stories) manages a nice balance of tragedy and comedy in the proceedings, and his screenplay borrows from Bukowski's poetry as well as from Factotum, the novel. You needn't know Bukowski's work to enjoy the movie, but Factotum could very well inspire you to read some of it. That's something good.
BOTTOM LINE: Bleak-ish, inebriated and quite exhilarating in the full-on Bukowski fashion.
(This film is rated 14-A)