The Man with the Beautiful Eyes

Drawn animation, UK, 1999
Director: Jonathan Hodgson
Writer: Charles Bukowski
Language: English
Colour: Colour
Runtime: 5 minutes

Short synopsis

An animated adaptation of the Charles Bukowski poem about a man's childhood recollection of meeting a man with blazing eyes.

Long synopsis

This animated adaptation of Charles Bukowski's poem of the same name has the poem read over a fluid series of images matched to the rhythm of the words. The film opens with a street scene: people pass by; a woman is looking at a 'Missing - have you seen this child?' poster. In voice-over, the poem's narrator starts to recount his memory of a strange house. Despite being forbidden to go near the house, he and his friends spent the summer playing in the bamboo-filled yard, pretending to be Tarzan - though there was no Jane - and feeding the fat, tame goldfish in the pond. They wondered if someone lived in the house, as they didn't see anybody there for weeks.

Then one day, they heard swearing, and an unshaven, unkempt man in his undershirt and pants came out, a cigar in his mouth and a bottle of whisky in his hand. His eyes 'blazed with brightness'. After acknowledging them briefly, he went back into the house with a little laugh. The children went home, deciding that their parents hadn't wanted them to see such a strong, natural man with beautiful eyes because they were ashamed of not being more like him. The friends kept going back to the house, but never heard or saw the man again. Then, one day, on the way home from school, they saw that house had burned down, the bamboo was gone and all the goldfish were dead.

After talking about it, the children decided that their parents must be responsible for the fire, They had been scared by the man's beauty and destroyed it. The friends were afraid that things like that would continue to happen throughout their lives, " that nobody wanted anybody to be strong and beautiful like that, that others would never allow it, and that many people would have to die."

Throughout the storytelling, the animation visually references the poem, and plays on the idea of suburban monotony. Zooming out for the last few lines of the poem, the film reveals a neighbourhood of regularised blocks, in which the story exists, and as it continues to zoom out, the grid created dominates first the state, and then the country.

The final image is of an exchange shop called Chinaski's (Bukowski's alter ego in his writing is Henry Chinaski) in front of which people walk, going about their monotonous daily business. The credits run to the sound of children playing, their voices fading slowly.

Background information

About the film

The director, Jonathan Hodgson, and the designer of the film, Jonny Hanah, decided on this project because of their shared admiration for the writings of the American poet Charles Bukowski. The idea was to create a visual sequence that matched the poetry, resulting in a flowing stream of images with no cuts. The film is shot using cel animation techniques with paint on paper, combined with camera work that makes the lines of the drawings flicker and vibrate. Jonathan Hodgson intended to create 'visual poetry' that does not illustrate the story in a literal way. He skilfully creates a sense of a confined physical space - streets, gardens, houses - and a time frame for the action, which act as parameters for the animation to move fluidly between representation and abstraction.

The tension between stasis and movement is explored throughout Hodgson's work. The elements that Hodgson had started to introduce into his animation with Feeling My Way - the presence of onscreen text, the word-as-image, a collage aesthetic - further enhances the visual quality of The Man with the Beautiful Eyes.

The film was broadcast on Channel 4 on 28 September 2000, as part of a half-hour programme during Animation Week. It has been screened in many international film festivals and has been awarded numerous prizes, including:

• Best Film Under Seven Minutes - British Animation Awards;
• Best Short Animation - BAFTA.

About the film-maker

Jonathan Hodgson graduated from Liverpool Polytechnic in 1981 with his film Dogs. He then moved on to study at the Royal College of Art where he graduated in 1983 with the celebrated Nightclub. Here he met Susan Young and set up the production company Practical Pictures which lasted for three years. During his time there, Hodgson worked on a number of commercial projects including a project for the United Nations promoting multilateral disarmament. Hodgson then worked as an animation director for a number of companies before founding his own production company, Sherbet, with partner producer Jonathan Bairstow in 1996. Through Sherbet, Hodgson has continued with his commercial work for clients such as Saab, Bell Atlantic and the BBC.

About Charles Bukowski

An internationally famous figure in contemporary poetry and prose, and a cult hero of disassociated youth everywhere, the poet Charles Bukowski emigrated to America from Germany in 1923, when he was three years old. Many (some self-made) myths surround Bukowski, and it is rumoured that although he was first published in the 1940s, he took twenty years out, ten of which were spent working for the postal service. On return to the literary world he brought with him the two key themes of his work: insanity and death.

Bukowski published his first story when he was 24 and began writing poetry at the age of 35. He published more than 45 books of poetry and prose in his lifetime and died in 1994 at the age of 74.

More information on Charles Bukowski see the following websites:

• http://bukowski.net/
• http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/bukowski.htm
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Bukowski
• http://www.jaydougherty.com/bukowski/index.html

Teaching materials and additional materials

The teaching materials have been developed by practising teachers to provide a springboard for your own work with your students. Feel free to use and adapt them appropriate to your students' needs.

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