Ben Gazzara delivers a gutsy, four-barreled performance as skid-row poet and storyteller Charles Bukowski (rechristened Charles Serking onscreen) in Tales of Ordinary Madness, blackly comic Italian director Marco Ferreris adaptation of Bukowskis roman à clef Erections, Ejaculations, Exhibitions and General Tales of Ordinary Madness. Half soused, with a 2 a.m. shadow and street urchin rags, Serking waltzes through the scummiest neighborhoods of the City of Angels, soaking up booze, poetry, and copulation, and lounging in flophouses and on grimy public buses. His bedmates are a midget, a string of seedy whores, and various earthy L.A. denizens, played by Susan Tyrell, Ornella Muti, and others; he eventually falls for a prostitute who can express her affection only via self-mutilation. Ferreri lets Bukowskis ribald humor flow throughout and exposes the dark erotic currents at the heart of the authors narratives. Laced with perverse, shocking imagery, this unbridled celebration of lifes dark underbelly has been praised by critics such as The New Yorkers Pauline Kael and Playboys Bruce Williamson for its genuine audacity and risktaking. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide