Howl

In Howl, directors Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman do what hundreds, probably thousands, of literature majors, tenured English professors and wannabe hipsters have been trying, and failing, to do for years. Thanks to a strong script, some fantastic acting and the imaginative animation designs of Eric Drooker, they make Allen Ginsberg’s epic Beat Generation poem, Howl, accessible. They don’t necessarily make it comprehensible, mind you; they leave that up to the audience to work on for themselves once the film is done. But they do give them the key – or maybe a key – to get them inside the mind of the man who created Howl in the first place.