Barfly (film)

Barfly
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Barbet Schroeder
Written by	Charles Bukowski
Produced by	Tom Luddy Fred Roos Barbet Schroeder
Starring	Mickey Rourke Faye Dunaway Alice Krige J.C. Quinn Frank Stallone
Cinematography	Robby Müller
Edited by	Éva Gárdos
Music by	Jack Baran
Production company	American Zoetrope
Distributed by	The Cannon Group, Inc.
Release date	October 16, 1987 (1987-10-16)
Running time	97 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$5 million[1]
Box office	$3.2 million[2]

Barfly is a 1987 American black comedy film directed by Barbet Schroeder and starring Mickey Rourke and Faye Dunaway. The film is a semi-autobiography of poet/author Charles Bukowski during the time he spent drinking heavily in Los Angeles, and it presents Bukowski's alter ego Henry Chinaski. The screenplay, written by Bukowski, was commissioned by the Iranian-born Swiss film director Barbet Schroeder, and it was published (with illustrations by the author) in 1984, when film production was still pending.^[3]

The Kino Flo light, now a ubiquitous tool in the film industry, was specially created by Robby Müller's electrical crew for the bathroom scene with Henry and Wanda, which would have been difficult to light using the conventional lampheads available at the time.

The film was "presented by" Francis Ford Coppola and features a cameo by Bukowski. It was entered into the 1987 Cannes Film Festival,^[4] where it competed for the Palme D'or.