Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain

I discovered Anthony Bourdain on 2018. I started to watch Parts Unknow and discovered a magnificent show about traveling, food, and life. Tony was a great storyteller and he had something that only a few people have, charisma. After watching this film I understand he was fighting his whole life against his demons, addictions and loneliness. This documentary is a must to understand how mental health issues are pretty dangerous.

This was an honest and at times brutally unflinching look at a very famous person who had a very enigmatic end. It will make you feel lots and miss the man more, but it's doesn't answer anything and leaves you feeling both sad at what happened, but glad that you were there for the ride. Still miss him, his show was so great... This is very much worth seeing.

Bourdain is no Gandhi, Martin Luther King or Joan of Arc. He's not someone who made a stunning contribution to world history. He's a celebrity chef, food and travel writer. But he was a man with a high profile whose suicide baffled a lot of people, including myself, leaving us to wonder why. This cleverly edited doco lays that out. Finding the answer is not at all easy but the filmmakers did find it. There was no cataclysmic moment but instead a build up and confluence of factors over many years. A man forever searching for IT, throwing himself into new things and new people only to find that for him they weren't IT and could never be IT. The fact is, there is no IT. Or perhaps IT, is something much more simple and yet profound, as Iggy Pop tells him at one point. This doco will stay with me for a very long time - unlike a lot of films that I find almost instantly forgettable - and deserves repeat viewing. If you're fascinated by the psychology of individuals then it is a rewarding experience. Side note: On the issue of using AI to replicate his voice in some parts, I have no issue. The words spoken are his and the filmmakers intentions are noble.

Seeing this movie convinced me that it was time well spent. It's sad, but in a way not surprising that he did not grow old. The movie is well worth seeing. It's definitely not a popcorn movie but one to sit and contemplate.

I'm glad that many people liked this film . It's still beyond me. How come I'm not finding my highly negative, but polite review that I submitted at least a week ago? I haven't walked out of a film for a few years, but I left this one after about 40 minutes. In terms of travel, it gives virtally no insights into the people or places visited. And Bourdain is only mildly amusing, like a child too taken with himself and his antics.

We lost him way too soon. This is honestly the best documentary I have ever seen. I just walked out of the theater and I want to see it again it was that good.

The most important connection of his early life before his success was lacking. Tony was a historian rebel storyteller and you get nothing about his early years. You just get a brief view of his childhood and early life and then it's off to the races with his success. The movie left me uninspired and sad. It makes you feel like your trapped in his Celebrity mindset and left me feeling sadness and ripped off for following his career all these years.

I read kitchen confidential, and i really enjoyed it. This documentary, on the other hand, was painful. Way, waaaay too long. No pacing. No structure. Poor footage. Such a shame, I got bored out of my mind. READ THE BOOK INSTEAD!

Roadrunner: A Film about Anthony Bourdain is not the documentary you thought it might be. It is not a fluff piece of praise about arguably the most famous celebrity chef of this century, nor does it claim to explain why he committed suicide at age 61. What it does do is thrill with his charisma, a personal magnetism that makes this tall, handsome man taller than anyone else in the room. From the moment his Kitchen Confidential hit the streets and became an instant New York Times best seller, the food world had an apologist for its greatness and a foodie realist who trumpeted the greatness of eating around the world. Not even tales of his heroin addiction could dissuade food lovers from making him the emblem of in-your-face food fashion. Home videos of him at times such as when he berates a fishmonger in front of Bourdain's Park Ave steak house, Les Halles, are endearing. As the doc depicts him, he is almost more interested in how a nation's cuisine mirrors its culture than the actual nature of the food itself. If fish is the Japanese signature food, then how it is presented is more important than the fish. He is roguish and bad-ass, not Batali or Emeril. The doc is itself more interested in spying on Bourdain or tracking him walking and talking than it is in how he helps his or someone else's restaurant attain star ratings. Director Morgan Neville has found the most charming footage, much of it outtakes from the hundreds of hours of him at play and occasionally at work on his celebrated cable shows. The kerfuffle about their using a bot for some of his narration is interesting but does not compromise the overall Bourdain depiction. The most fascinating "at play" is his intriguing love affairs with his second wife, Ottavia, and Italian actress Asia Argento, who eventually leaves him for another man and us to wonder if that split is the cause of his final act (he hung himself in a hotel room in 2018). Lamentably this great writer left no note to help us understand that inscrutable act. To its credit, the documentary makes no claims to know why but neatly allows voice overs to make insightful, if not superficial, conclusions that this peripatetic celebrity could not find his place in even the most exotic places on earth. Ironically, Bourdain claimed to be an open book about his talent and his demons, but really never allowed the latter to reveal themselves or explain his exit. My own inference from the tantalizing details of this outstanding documentary is that, like Hemingway, Plath, and Robin Williams, to name only three famous suicides, his talent and his charm overwhelmed even him, to the extent that they were crushing the real Tony out of existence. He never knew himself well enough to be able to save himself. Who knows? The doc does well, anyway, showing the daily thrills of Bourdain, how much he loved people more than food, and how restless his soaring talent was. In the end, he may have been too gifted to be able to live with himself. And that's what I thought about Hemingway as well. Great gifts require great care lest they destroy. Roadrunner: The Life of Anthony Bourdain is a fascinating study of a celebrated chef who was far more interesting than the food he celebrated.

As I am watching the virtual advanced viewing, the words I keep coming back to are enigmatic genius. This brazen, sarcastic, difficult, demanding man clearly loved deeply and was deeply loved. Introverted, shy, talk show superstar, Bourdain was the ultimate professional perfectionist who embraced change and the unknown. There is so much great footage, Anthony (or Tony as he is often referred to) is able to posthumously tell his own story. This is a man who was able to channel an addictive personality into productive, thrill seeking storytelling - and we were able to vicariously travel the world with him. I learned so much from him through the years. He is one of the very best storytellers we have ever been blessed with. I am not sure I learned much new about him, but I loved every minute of watching this. If anything pleasantly surprised me, it was his religious conversation with Eric where he said that he tried to emulate Christ each day. My primary takeaway - Despite having an unusually challenging and sometimes annoying personality, Anthony was truly special and unique. You can tell that the people fortunate to spend time with him (man, woman, and child) all seem to be in love with this complex man (deeper than a casual love - you can see it in their eyes and hear it in their words and voices). It is remarkable that he felt like he wasn't loved. And as huge as his personality was, like any great journalist, people truly talked to him because he truly listened, was interested, and empathized. As is common with true genius, he burned bright hot and scorched his path through this world, our hearts, and our minds. I have had a hard time accepting that he really committed suicide, but this move shows the path. Even though you know the ending in advance, it is still very powerful. The movie is also full of great lines and insights - maybe watch it with a notepad in hand! There were lots of tears watching this. I miss his show being part of my life, and somehow, the re-runs just don't cut it.