Doc (2008)

This film sheds light on an original mind as well as post-war cultural history. Academy-Award nominee Immy Humes' portrait of her father, Harold L. "Doc" Humes (1926-1992). Immy, in Doc's own words, "puts a frame around the wreckage" with her affectionate, yet profoundly disquieting portrait. Humes became a literary phenomenon when in 1958 at age 32 he published The Underground City and in 1959 a second, equally acclaimed novel, Men Die. The novels take on timely themes of war, racism, politics, and conspiracy. (They were reissued by Random House in 2008.) Humes, a co-founder of the prestigious literary journal, The Paris Review, was a peripatetic "talking machine" who for decades charmed, confounded and infuriated his distinguished friends. George Plimpton, Norman Mailer, Paul Auster, Peter Matthiessen (who speaks of his years as an undercover agent for the CIA), William Styron, Jonas Mekas, and Timothy Leary. Together they recall an extraordinary man, a Zelig-like figure who led protests against the cabaret card laws, and for the right to sing in Washington Square Park ("3000 Beatniks Riot in Village" - NYC headline). He championed the healing qualities of marijuana, and LSD; built a paper house; shot a Beat film of Don Quixote called Don Peyote; and managed Mailer's 1961 run for Mayor of New York. He later suffered from mental illness and became paranoid, but, well, remember that "just because you're paranoid it doesn't mean that..." Please note: a 90-minute version was released for theatrical and DVD; a 60-minute version that includes some things NOT in the longer version, go figure, was broadcast on PBS' Independent Lens series. The 2 versions also have a different musical score - great jazz in both cases.