http://somecamerunning.typepad.com/some_came_running/2012/02/being-flynn-and-nothingness.html
Glenn Kenny's review is perceptive in pointing out that poet/author Nick Flynn's BEING FLYNN (adapted from the memoir ANOTHER BULLSHIT NIGHT IN SUCK CITY) has obviously been run through the nibbled-to-death-by-development-notes Hollywood homogenization process.
As coincidence would have it, BEING FLYNN director Paul Weitz' brother Chris' recent A BETTER LIFE (with Damian Bechir's excellent lead performance) seems a model of how to hit a balance between realistic character observation and the demands of commercial narrative filmmaking.
I haven't read ANOTHER.... but I want to now in order to have an idea of what was sacrificed between page and filming.
However, I did read Flynn's poetry volume SOME ETHER, which is a stark, moving tribute to his mother (another great Julianne Moore performance in the film) and the loss young Nick felt after her suicide.
And I sincerely hope at least a few of the theatrical viewers of BEING FLYNN will take the time to seek out/buy SOME ETHER.
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