Jürgen Ploog

The Beat Hotel, a new film by Alan Govenar, goes deep into the legacy of the American Beats in Paris during the heady years between 1957 and 1963, when Allen Ginsberg, Peter Orlovsky and Gregory Corso fled the obscenity trials in the United States surrounding the publication of Ginsberg’s poem Howl. They took refuge in a cheap no-name hotel they had heard about at 9, Rue Git le Coeur and were soon joined by William Burroughs, Ian Somerville, Brion Gysin, and others from England and elsewhere in Europe, seeking out the “freedom” that the Latin Quarter of Paris might provide.

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An exhaustive examination of cut-ups, the control machine, and the algebra of need figure in this epic found-footage adaptation of Burroughs’s 1964 novel, which pits Inspector Lee and the Nova Police against the Nova Mob: Sammy The Butcher, Green Tony, The Brown Artist, Jacky Blue Note, Izzy The Push, The Subliminal Kid, Uranian Willy, and Mr Bradly Mr Martin, alias The Ugly Spirit. Features unreleased readings by Burroughs and voiceovers by Proctor & Bergman of the Firesign Theatre on such topics as hot crab people, language as virus, tape recorder warfare, death dwarfs, and Hassan Sabbah: the Old Man of the Mountain. “Minutes to go. Souls rotten from their orgasm drugs, flesh shuddering from their nova ovens, prisoners of the earth to come out.” (via cinema.indiana.edu)

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An hour-long interview with author William S. Burroughs in which he expounds on American culture, art and morals.

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