Documentary Screening and Shorts

The poet and writer Lawrence Ferlinghetti is an iconic presence in the world of arts and letters. For well over half a century, he has helped shape the currents of poetry and literature through his forceful engagement with society. Armed with an ideological position that often found him at odds with the political dogma of his day, Ferlinghetti became the best-selling poet of the modern era, a literary mercenary, and a rebel at the forefront of a cultural revolution.

In this definitive documentary, director Christopher Felver crafts an incisive, sharply-wrought portrait that reveals Ferlinghetti’s true role as catalyst for numerous literary careers, and for the Beat movement itself. Felver’s one-on-one interviews with Ferlinghetti, made over the course of a decade, touch upon a rich mélange of characters and events that began to unfold in post-war America. These events include the publication of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl, William S. Burroughs’ Naked Lunch, and Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, as well as the divisive events of the Vietnam War, the sexual revolution, and this country’s perilous march towards intellectual and political bankruptcy. Since its inception in 1953, Ferlinghetti’s City Lights Bookstore quickly became an iconic literary institution, embodying social change and literary freedom. Continuing to thrive for over five decades, it is a cornerstone of America’s modern literary and cultural history.

Also being screened is History of the Airplane and Hum Bomb! by Allen GInsberg

About Chris Felver