Poetry in Motion Movie Review

I thought I loved it, but after seeing Poetry in Motion, a documentary interviewing some 20 modern poets (not a small number of whom are singer/songwriters like Tom Waits) and featuring performance footage of them as well.

Unfortunately for every Bukowski there's an Anne Waldman, who screeches her poetry with such a degree of nuisance that my wife begged me to turn off the DVD.

Good thing for Ron Mann's movie we don't get many other options to see Burroughs, Carroll, and Ginsberg delivering their own material. (And some of it is simple narrative, by the way.) Interesting for about 15 minutes (and not in a row), this is the ultimate short film that just happens to run really, really long. Unless, that is, you're really into group screaming, chanting, and mindless banging on the piano.