

Through its many different stories and perspectives, Howl pierced its way through the hearts of numerous audiences good and bad. "Howl" is a well done film that should be enjoyed by everyone with an appreciation of poetry and of poetry in our history.Many influential poems have been written throughout the 1950’s in America, but none have taken such a controversial stance such as Allen Ginsberg’s, Howl. The revelations into the mind of Ginsberg were done subtly and wonderfully connected with the arguments in the trial. The animated sequences were abstract and detached me from the film but I'm sure to all the artists out there they represented the poem accurately. James Franco as Ginsberg helped me come to an understanding of what the man behind the poem was all about. The film smartly used the Supreme Court definition of "obscenity", and the reading of the poem itself to help me come to an understanding of the charges laid against the poem. Howl was accused of being "obscene" and threatened to be banned. The great thing about "Howl" is that I didn't know any of that before the film, it was able to educate me about a remarkable young man and literary voice.


Ginsberg represented the new generation of the young, confused nonconformists and he wrote poetry that ignited the wrath of the older generation that rejected their freethinking ways. Allen Ginsberg's poem Howl is brought to life with a mix of adult animation, court-room drama and the beliefs of a young hero of sorts.
