“A Boy Has Never Wept nor Dashed a Thousand Kim”

Even if Rutger Hauer had stopped making art before the turn of the millennium, he would still occupy a hallowed place in the Microkhan pantheon for his trailblazing work in Surviving the Game. Fortunately for us, the Dutch actor continued to hammer away at his craft in the early part of this century, including a turn as the lead in little-seen The Last Words of Dutch Schultz (above). The 22-minute film features a smorgasbord of surreal images to accompany Hauer’s reading of Dutch Schultz’s dying declaration, a masterpiece of accidental poetry. (Please note that the film has virtually nothing to do with William S. Burroughs’ infamous unproduced screenplay of the same name.)

Hauer’s throaty, slow-paced interpretation of the deluded rant probably bears almost no relation to Schultz’s actual delivery, which was likely woozily mumbled on account of his bullet wounds. But the narration works beautifully regardless—Hauer has a gift for making even the most nonsenical lines, like the one referenced in this post’s title, sound like pearls of Socratic wisdom.