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Factotum
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MPAA RATING: R for language and sexual content
Starring Matt Dillon, Lili Taylor, Fisher Stevens, Marisa Tomei, Didier Flamand, Adrienne Shelly, Karen Young, and Tony Lyons
Based on the novel by Charles Bukowski, Factotum is the story of a man living on the edge; a writer who risks everything, tries anything, and finds poetry in life's pleasure and pain. (IFC Films)
| GENRE(S): | Drama |
| WRITTEN BY: |
Bent Hamer
Jim Stark Charles Bukowski (novel) |
| DIRECTED BY: | Bent Hamer |
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: December 26, 2006 Theatrical: August 18, 2006 |
| RUNNING TIME: | 94 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: | USA / Norway |
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
The average user rating for this movie is 5.7 (out of 10) based on 15 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Chris M. gave it a0:
Very rarely do I turn something off before the end but was extremely tempted. The whole thing tries so hard it is painful. Bukowski's writing has got some merit, this film has none.
Chad S. gave it a7:
When a man hits a woman, there's usually a second time. In "Factotum", it's one punch thrown by Henry(Matt Dillon), one thud on the floor by Jan the thud-maker(Lili Taylor). Unlike "Walk the Line"(the whitewashed biopic of country legend Johnny Cash), the filmmaker doesn't want to portray their iconoclastic subject(Charles Bukowski) as a saint; this is an indie, after all, "Factotum" needs street(or at least, Sundance street) cred. But surely Henry Chinaski is prone to more than one violent outburst if he's some unrelenting drunk who can't hold onto a job. No drunk just hits the bottle; he'll hit jukeboxes, glass windows, and the corporeal flesh of bar patrons and fifty-cent whores alike, especially the fifty-cent whores. "Factotum" is episodic; it's nothing more than a meandering anthology of the women Henry happens to be shacked up with as he lurches from bar to crappy job to bar. Lucid or not, Bukowski/Chinaski had enough clarity to write "Factotum", the memoir that is the basis for this agreeable depiction of the infamous poet laureate of the streets. Dillon is good, but not great as Chinaski; or maybe, the filmmaker is at fault; maybe, he fell into temptation to myth-make. In place of genuine angst and other degrees of implosive behavior, he chose to uphold the romantic notion of a writer victimized by stampeding pink elephants; the pachyderms of proof. The elephants need thicker hides. Chinaski needs to be more tortured; more "Bukowski-in-a-china-shop"-like.
Trapper gave it a0:
Absolutely the dullest/ monotone/ smoke/ booze/ ****ing movie of all time. Please--this movie was Grade E-.
Jacobsen T gave it a2:
Awful Awful Awful movie. Don't pay money to see this, or even rent it. It is in no way inspirational like so many people are saying, it has no plot, and it is not funny at all. Nothing happens, and nothing is done in the film to make the nothingness unique.
Cathy L. gave it a0:
This is the second worst movie I've ever seen.
Thomas M. gave it a5:
The acting is all top-notch, but this is a film that goes absolutely nowhere. Maybe that's the point, but if we are to be expected to remain awake throughout the films 94 minutes, some further revelations about this character might be in order. After 10 minutes, I knew everything about him that I was going to know. The rest was simply wallowing in the fetid path of this nearly moribund character.
Kurt L. gave it a9:
Matt Dillon is brilliant if not a little too pretty for the role. I like the different techniques used by the director to affect meaning. It’s definitely a more literary approach to film which is so refreshing these days. Funny and sad simultaneously.
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