William S. Burroughs

Good Will Hunting

Will Hunting is a headstrong, working-class genius who is failing the lessons of life. After one too many run-ins with the law, Will's last chance is a psychology professor, who might be the only man who can reach him.

Queer

In 1950s Mexico City, William Lee, an American ex-pat in his late forties, leads a solitary life amidst a small American community. However, the arrival in town of Eugene Allerton, a young student, stirs William into finally establishing a meaningful connection with someone.

The Black Rider

Inspired by the German folktale, Wilhelm, a file clerk, falls in love with a huntsman's daughter. In order to marry, Wilhelm must prove his worth as a hunter and gain her father's approval. Naive and desperate, he makes a deal with a devil named Pegleg.

Twister

An oddball family on a Kansas farm are trapped in their farmhouse by an impending storm. The patriarch of the clan is a retired soda pop tycoon. He is currently dating a children's TV evangelist. Also living at the farm is his layabout daughter and her precocious 8 year old daughter, his would-be artist son, the son's fiancée, and the black maid. Also thrown into the mix is the daughter's ex-husband, a ne-er-do-well who is seeking to get back in his ex-wife's good graces.

Thanksgiving Prayer

An indictment ballad of all the different political groups in America.

Drugstore Cowboy

Portland, Oregon, 1971. Bob Hughes is the charismatic leader of a peculiar quartet, formed by his wife, Dianne, and another couple, Rick and Nadine, who skillfully steal from drugstores and hospital medicine cabinets in order to appease their insatiable need for drugs. But neither fun nor luck last forever.

Bloodhounds of Broadway

On New Year's Eve 1928, in the New York underworld, a gambler sells his body to science, a gangster needs a transfusion, and a gambler is on the run

Naked Lunch

Blank-faced bug killer Bill Lee and his dead-eyed wife, Joan, like to get high on Bill's pest poisons while lounging with Beat poet pals. After meeting the devilish Dr. Benway, Bill gets a drug made from a centipede. Upon indulging, he accidentally kills Joan, takes orders from his typewriter-turned-cockroach, ends up in a constantly mutating Mediterranean city and learns that his hip friends have published his work -- which he doesn't remember writing.

Ice Cream

A short film about a mysterious ceremony, based on an essay by William S. Burroughs.

The Junky's Christmas

Burroughs takes down a book and reads us the story of Danny the Carwiper, who spends Christmas Day trying to score a fix, but finds the Christmas spirit instead.

The Wild Boys

Island of La Réunion, in the beginning of the 20th century. Five teenagers commit a savage crime. As punishment, a Dutch captain takes them to a supernatural island with luxuriant vegetation and bewitching powers.

William Buys a Parrot

A bizarre silent short film showing author William S. Burroughs negotiating to buy a parrot.

Chappaqua

Semi-autobiographical story of Conrad Rooks, who travels to France to undergo a drug-withdrawal cure. Flashbacks to the beginings of psychedelia in San Fran. Though initially confusing, as Rooks blends drug-illusion with reality, and cuts color with black-and-white and monochrome tinted shots, "Chappaqua" is conventionally constructed with a beginning, middle, and end.

Joy Division

A chronological account of the influential late 1970s English rock band.

The Last Words of Dutch Schultz

The last words of the gangster Dutch Schultz form the starting point for this animated documentary. The FBI noted these words down on Schultz’ deathbed, in the hope he would betray his colleagues. Here, spoken in the english version by Rutger Hauer, they accompany the sober, pencil drawn animation based on traced (film) images from Schultz’ time: the late 1920s, early 1930s.

Wanderlust

A look at the mystique of road movies, combining interviews, film clips, music, photography, literature and a narrative storyline featuring Paul Rudd and Tom McCarthy.

The Discipline of D.E.

"The Discipline of D.E." is a short 16mm film directed by Gus Van Sant. It’s based on a story in “Exterminator!” by William Burroughs that at times reads like Buddhist noir: "DE is a way of doing. DE simply means doing whatever you do in the easiest most relaxed way you can manage which is also the quickest and most efficient way, as you will find as you advance in DE. You can start right now tidying up your flat, moving furniture or books, washing dishes, making tea, sorting papers. Don't fumble, jerk, grab an object. Drop cool possessive fingers onto it like a gentle old cop making a soft arrest.”

William S. Burroughs: The Possessed

Thelema Now! host Frater Puck discusses William S. Burroughs, possession, synchronicities and chaos magick

Taking Tiger Mountain

Militant feminist scientists brainwash research subject to assassinate the Welsh Minister of Prostitution. Meanwhile World War III is being fought and the USA has been invaded.

The Cut-Ups

Essentially a dizzying montage of quirky shots of legendary Beat Generation writer William S. Burroughs and noted surrealist artist Brion Gysin, this nearly 20 minute avant-garde short features repeated articulations of such random things as "Hello," "Where are we now?," and "Look at that picture" instead of music or standard dialogue. The narrative is decidedly nonlinear and perplexing, with no discernible plot whatsoever as we see images of Gysin working on his paintings and calligraphic designs and Burroughs rummaging through draws, packing a suitcase, giving a young man a physical, making a call in a phone booth, and waiting on a platform for a subway train.

The Japanese Sandman

At once wryly comedic travelogue and heartbreaking tale of love lost, THE JAPANESE SANDMAN is a visual interpretation of a letter William Burroughs' wrote to Allen Ginsberg in 1953, recounting his travels in Central America. Told through Burroughs' wickedly incisive voice, cocaine snorting in Panama and post-prom hand-jobs in 1931 St. Louis become a meditation on loss, memory and the human condition.

The Making of Drugstore Cowboy

Portland, 1988. Filmmaker Gus Van Sant shoots Drugstore Cowboy, the project that will bring he and his collaborators a formidable burst of mainstream attention. Starring Matt Dillon, Kelly Lynch, and Heather Graham, the film follows a roving quartet of drug addicts — and, consequently, drug thieves, especially from the businesses of the title — who wash up in Portland's then-gritty Pearl District. A death among their own spooks the leader of the pack into trying to clean up, and an encounter with a sepulchral junkie priest does its part to convince him further. Or maybe we should call him a Junkie priest, portrayed as he is by a controversial cameo from writer William S. Burroughs. "I'm going back to the old days," Burroughs says of his role early in the above documentary on the making of Drugstore Cowboy. "The old days when they used to give people morphine in jail. The old days before the methadone programs."

Decoder

F.M. discovers that different sonic frequencies induce different patterns of behaviour in listeners, first in his own studio but later in the local "H-Burger" restaurant where the passive muzak appears to be wiping people's emotions.

The Book of Life

New Year's Eve takes on new meaning when the Devil, Jesus Christ, and Christ's assistant Magdalena discuss and debate the End of the World.

American Playhouse

American Playhouse is an anthology television series periodically broadcast by Public Broadcasting Service in the United States.