Factotum (2006)

Best movie of this year hands down!

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

This is not the Bukowski novel of the same title. Some of the incidents are from that book, others are from Buk's other stories. But much of the point of Bukowski's writing seems to have been missed. None of his intelligence, skepticism, humor and the grim determination to survive and "get through" life. This film's Chinaski just seems to be only a guy who likes to drink and get into fights (which is part of Bukowski's writing, but only the most superficial). Kind of reminds me of the "dumbed down" Clint Eastwood movie "Every Which Way But Loose" where he is driving around in a truck with a monkey or orangutan or something. Interesting that some of the scenes from another Bukowski-inspired film--"Barfly"--is also in this movie. This film seems to have been made after Bukowski died, so he didn't have any input into it. For Bukowski's own perspective on the whole movie-making process and what it does to his work, see his novel "Hollywood." It's worth reading.By the way, Bukowski does have another link to the movie business--he used to be a drinking buddy of Leonard DiCaprio's Dad. Any time spent reading Bukowski's actual writings--prose or poetry--is time well spent.--B2

This movie has some good lines, but watching Dillon's less-than-masterful Rourke impersonation just left me wanting to see the original. I like Marisa Tomei but she's no Faye Dunaway.Also, in my opinion, the number one movie rule is to make the lead character someone you care about. You might not LOVE the character, but you should care what happens to him. This is achieved in Barfly with the hilarious running gag about the fights with Eddie the bartender. The main fight in Factotum is when, completely unprovoked, he stalks up to the Lily Taylor character in a bar, punches her to the floor and calls her a whore.The whole thing just didn't work. Again, some great lines -- some laugh-out-loud funny -- but as a movie overall it's a fail. Mediocre attempt at reinventing something that was brilliant, and you can't get past that. Next? Let's remake Breakfast at Tiffany's with Kate Hudson.

It's possible that people who enjoyed this movie, did so because they had previous knowledge of the writer this movie is loosely based upon, Charles Bukowski. I have never heard of this author going into the movie, and I'm not sure it would have mattered that this fictional story is based upon what life as Charles Bukowski is romanticized to be. The fact that I like Matt Dillon in most of his films, didn't make me like his character Henry any better.Parts of the film include voice over of Henry speaking. In most films they use this as a narration tool to let us know things the movie otherwise can't reveal in the scenes. In "Factotum" I am afraid the dialogue was the text in the written submissions Henry was making to a publisher. I hope I am wrong. It was mind-numbing drivel, like a diary of how one behaves like a loser, but with no skills in telling it even in an entertaining fashion. Henry's voice is just a simple narrator to his mundane life of getting fired and getting drunk, it suggests nothing poetic or redeeming at all.I'm not opposed to enjoying movies which show the alcoholic spiraling out of control, even if it has a totally unsatisfying ending. I really enjoyed "Leaving Las Vegas" with Nicolas Cage and Elisabeth Shue as Ben and Sera. Here a guy commits suicide by drinking himself to death, but he convinces you to like him in spite of his terrible character flaws and bad behavior. "Factotum" just can not accomplish this for me.

I swear, I felt like taking a nice swig of some liquor, after watching it. This movie, is character driven, and Matt Dillon plays Henry Chinaski, a quite amusing character that calls himself a writer and goes on about life hitting the bottle, and finding new jobs and going through the motions with total disregard of it, the movie doesn't have an overall theme though, is just a more casual movie, with a very entertaining in a dark way character. The constant bar scenes, the constant drinking, that dark lull of it, has an odd and quite dark attraction to it. Some will say, that Chinaski slow crawl to degeneration will make someone be turn off to drinking. But quite the opposite, at least for me.This movie is not recommended for everyone, but if you stick around long enough, it could be a nice surprise though.