MOVIE REVIEW : ‘POETRY IN MOTION’: WORDS THAT LEAP

If the language that surrounds us every day seems flat and uninspiring, the antidote is “Poetry in Motion” (at 8 tonight at Melnitz Theater, UCLA), a vial of smelling salts for those reeling from indifferent speech.

It’s Canadian film maker Ron Mann’s dazzling anthology of 24 leading contemporary poets, who do everything but read their works. They sing, bop, chant, jive and croon them; they say them to the accompaniment of an electronic pulse or a jazz trio, or a pair of sinuous dancers. The effect is bracing, revivifying, restorative.

It’s a broad cross section of voices, bridged by curmudgeon Charles Bukowski devilishly advocating that poetry today “hasn’t shown any dance, hasn’t shown any moxie.” The 23 who follow him throw that notion back in his teeth. Anne Waldman--beautiful, elegant in gold and silver--weaves a song to “Empty Space” with her whole body; Tom Waits croaks delicately to his guitar. Kenward Elmslie cradles a big chrome tape deck in his lap, singing his sweetly sad refrain to its music; Ed Sanders’ memorable poem to Henri Matisse is done to an electronic pulse the poet has devised to accompany a modern muse.

You don’t have to know poetry to dig this group; if you already do, so much the better. But to stumble, unsuspecting, onto Scotland’s Helen Adam--60ish, looking like some present-day Madame Arcati--with her rollicking salute to the cockroach and the rat in the meter of “ ‘Will you walk a little faster?’ said the whiting to the snail” is only one of the night’s grand diversions. You’ll also find the dryness of William Burroughs: in three-piece suit and silk tie, looking for all the world like a bank president--until he begins his ode to the Old West with a growling twist in his throat.

You will also find Jim Carroll, Amiri Baraka, Robert Creeley, Allen Ginsberg, John Giorno, Ntozake Shange and John Cage, among others. While you can always mourn the poets not present, 90 minutes is 90 minutes and Mann’s technique allows us a sense of almost all the participants, discussing the past and present of the art and giving a glimpse of its future.

Mann himself will be present tonight; the program opens with a short look at Manhattan photographer Marcia Resnick and her all-male gallery, called appropriately “Marcia Resnick’s Bad Boys.” Information: (213) 206-8013.

‘POETRY IN MOTION’

Producer, director Ron Mann. Associate producer John Giorno. Editor Peter Wintonick. Camera Robert Fresco. Sound David Joliat. Executive producer Murray Sweigman. Production design Sandra Kybartas. Lighting Jock Brandis. Research David Segal. With Helen Adam, Miguel Algarin, Amiri Baraka, Ted Berrigan, Charles Bukowski, William Burroughs, John Cage, Jim Carroll, Jayne Cortez, Robert Creeley, Christopher Dewdney, Diane Di Prima, Kenward Elmslie, Four Horseman, Allen Ginsberg, John Giorno, Michael McClure, Michael Ondaatje, Ed Sanders, Ntozake Shange, Gary Snyder, Tom Waits, Anne Waldman.

Times rated: Mature.

Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.