Years before the infamous obscenity trial of comedian Lenny Bruce,
counter-cultural icon and Beat poet Allen Ginsberg also stood trial — or,
more accurately, the publisher of his long-form poem that gives this
film its title did — for deigning to hold up a mirror to American
hypocrisy. Co-written and directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman,
Howl isn’t a commercial work, or satisfying on any predictably plotted
dramatic level. But, like a great song one surrenders to, its
tangential, multi-varied approach captures the urgency and dread of
Ginsberg’s groundbreaking, semi-autobiographical work, which recounts in
searing detail various underbelly road trips, love affairs and his
search for personal liberation.

Starring James Franco as
Ginsberg, Howl unfolds in a fractured and cerebral style, interweaving
four stories: a Socratic courtroom drama that follows the aforementioned
landmark 1957 obscenity trial, with Jon Hamm’s prosecutor and David Strathairn’s defense attorney squaring off against one another; an imaginative, feverish animated ride
through some of the text’s stories; a chat between Ginsberg and an
unseen interviewer; and a slightly more conventional,
black-and-white-lensed biographical portrait of a man who strove for
new ways to express himself and capture the aching ambivalence of those
he encountered.

There’s a quite contradictory nature, a fiery
reticence, at the soul of Ginsberg and his confessional writing, and in
his virtuoso performance Franco captures that quite well, especially in
his vocal timbre, which swells and recedes like an ocean tide. The
inclusion of animation — another potentially tricky thing — connects in a
certain roundabout way like similar footage from Ari Folman’s Waltz
with Bashir. Neither flat-out surreal nor entirely subjective, it
instead aims for (and captures) the heat of feeling, for those
unfamiliar with and/or resistant to the text. We all have to howl, from
time to time. For more information on the movie, click here. (Oscilloscope, unrated, 90 minutes)