"Howl," 2

        The poem Howl is a howl of anguish and ecstasy.  It is about institutional psychiatric care (Allen Ginsberg's mother and his friend Carl Solomon were both sufferers), about people prostituted to money and industry, about hypocricy and corruption in government, about young people struggling to make sense of their lives, discovering and rapturing with sex and drugs and love including homosexual sex.

       The rhythms of the poem Howl are powerful and incantatory; the language is uninhibited, words that friends use to be honest and forthright with each other.  The judge rightly vindicated Howl, and Howl stands as a great testament of "telling it like it is" with force and accuracy and high emotion.

       "Howl!"      The word is imitative of the sound we and animals utter.  The poem is that cry at length.  The movie is a majestic work of art and love.