Howl! Boulder! James Franco! Allen Ginsberg! Naropa! Beat!

James Franco is portraying two Boulderites in two feature films slated for release in now, in 2010.

In Howl he portrays Allen Ginsberg, the Beat Buddhist Gay Activist poet who resided in Boulder from 1974 until 1984, and then returned Spring and Summer ever year until his death in April 1997.

The other Boulderite that Franco portrayed is climber Aron Ralston, depicted in his harrowing ordeal in Moab, in the film 127 Hours directed by, Danny Boyle of the Academy Award winning Slumdog Millionaire.

(*Congratulations to Aron and his wife Jessica on the birth of their child).

In Howl, Franco portrays 1950’s era Allen Ginsberg around the time of Howl‘s release and court trial, with animated scenes drawn by one of the few people that I have met who I can say is a true genius: Eric Drooker.

A friend of Ginsberg who provides the animations for Howl, Drooker met Ginsberg as an activist in New York City and went on to collaborate with him on Illuminated Poems. Drooker would visit Boulder when Ginsberg was in town; currently the posthumous collaborative book Howl: the film, is out. Drooker is a genius in the lineage of Lyn Ward; truly the first graphic novelist.

At the October 21st (the 41st anniversary of Kerouac’s death) and 22nd screenings of Howl at CU in Munzinger as part of IFS, Robert Frank’s Pull My Daisy will be shown in a rare 16mm print, before the 7 pm shows at 6:30 and after the 9 pm shows.

Pull My Daisy was written by Jack Kerouac and stars part-time Boulderites Gregory Corso, Allen Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky. Kerouac named Howl as well as Naked Lunch and is being further immortalized in the screen adaptation of On the Road, currently filming. The Rocky Mountain scenes were filmed in Argentina this last August. The 22nd annual Kerouac Memorial Reading on October 21st, 2010 8 pm at the world famous Laughing Goat Coffee House at 1709 Pearl, free admission.

The Howl screenings on October 21st and 22nd at CU are $6 adults $5 students.

On October 12th Howl will be shown at the historic Boulder Theatre.

Beat Book Shop will have copies of Howl on hand at the CU screenings.  Howl at the Boulder Theatre will also have a panel of Naropa Faculty, Staff and Alumni discussing the poem after the film, featuring Lisa Birman, Junior Burke and Jim Cohn.

The Life & Times of Allen Ginsberg will be shown at the Naropa PAC Sunday October 3rd, 2010 at 6:30 pm for free, followed by a screening of Stan Brakhage’s films at Atlas 100 CU campus also free.

Boulder theatre films are $15.00