July 13, 2010

Harvey Pekar, RIP

Here's my 2003 review for The American Conservative of American Splendor, in which Paul Giamatti portrayed the underground comic book writer.

12 comments:

dfadfsdf said...

Great movie.

l said...

Pekar would have remained a complete unknown were it not for Crumb's love of weirdos and losers.

MQ said...

Love the R. Crumb quotes. Now there's a genius...great movie made about him too ("Crumb").

Anonymous said...

I heard that Harvey's brother Harry Pekar was a real dick.

Marvin said...

I had never heard of Harvey Pekar but I saw this movie after hearing all the critics raving about it. It's a well written well acted movie, but I found it utterly depressing. After watching the movie I had no desire to read any of Pekar's work.

Anonymous said...

He was a great guest of Letterman's on his NBC show but Dave eventually turned against him.

I guess HP wasn't far enough to the Left for Dave.

Jason said...

One of the best movies for understanding Ohio ever made.

Disgruntled said...

I've always found American Splendor a great "feel good" movie.

If something isn't going well in my life, I watch it and say to myself, at least I don't live in Cleveland! And then I go surfing.

TGGP said...

Your point about the "post-modernism" of the middle ages is echoed here.

Dutch Boy said...

Only in America could that schlemiel Pekar be a celebrity!

Correction said...

One of the best movies for understanding CLEVELAND ever made.

Anonymous said...

I think you missed the mark in that review, at least of the comic book part. It' a deeply personal and, I guess, representative view of a shlub living in the 1960's-70's. I was born later. The stories are interesting because they are real. It's not genius, it's just pertinent to my interests, at least.