Roy’s World: Barry Gifford’s Chicago

“Barry Gifford is a killer f***kin’ writer . . . ROY’S WORLD captures his childhood and that time in Chicago, and many other places. I really enjoyed watching it and then contemplating what goes on inside a person with this history. I really love that world and the things that can happen there.” — David Lynch

Hailed as “William Faulkner by way of B-movie film noir, porn paperbacks and Sun Records rockabilly,” poet, author, and screenwriter Barry Gifford has given the world more than forty works, including the Sailor and Lula novels that inspired David Lynch’s WILD AT HEART. Featuring Willem Dafoe, Matt Dillon, and Lili Taylor, Rob Christopher’s documentary brilliantly brings to life Gifford’s autobiographical collection of stories, capturing a vanished 1950s Chicago through an impressionistic combination of beguiling archival footage, animation, and spoken word. Chicago jazz musician and composer Jason Adasiewicz’s first original score, performed by such luminaries as Joshua Abrams and Hamid Drake, adds to the film’s noir atmosphere.

Preceded by MY LAST MARTINI

Rob Christopher’s new short MY LAST MARTINI, adapted from a story by Barry Gifford, stars Mickey O’Sullivan as a frustrated writer who breaks his own rule and orders a third martini. A mysterious woman, played by TWIN PEAKS favorite Wendy Robie, soon joins him from the next booth looking for someone willing to listen. Shot entirely on location at Milwaukee’s legendary Bryant’s Cocktail Lounge, the film is a darkly funny, intimate encounter between two strangers over drinks. Produced by John Otterbacher and Aaron Wertheimer. (14 min)

Part of Barry Gifford: Wild Lives, Lost Highways.