BUKOWSKI ISN'T QUITE THE BUM YOU THINK HE IS.

Byline: Fred Shuster Staff Writer

YOU PROBABLY thought Kurt Cobain invented projectile vomiting.

He did, in a way; Cobain took it mainstream. But Charles Bukowski was there first.

Which is why ``Bukowski: Born Into This'' - the documentary about the noted alcoholic and Los Angeles ``skid-row'' poet - is a grueling two hours spent in the company of this one-man argument for the return of Prohibition. Born in 1920, the late Bukowski is perhaps best-known as the real-life model for the Barbet Schroeder film ``Barfly,'' which was written by the poet and starred Mickey Rourke. The first four letters of that title accurately sum up Bukowski's method of working.

Early in ex-ad man John Dullaghan's painfully overlong documentary, Bukowski prepares for a reading by making sure a vomit receptacle is handy on stage. In show-biz annals, Bukowski's personal-appearance demands stand among the easiest to meet.

While Bukowski's literary reputation is mixed (at several points in the film, Bukowski refers to his own prose as mere typing), his public antics overshadow the work. While aficionados point to collections such as ``Notes of a Dirty Old Man'' and ``Love Is a Dog From Hell,'' as well as the autobiographical novels ``Post Office'' and ``Women,'' Bukowski held them all in equal esteem.

If nothing else, he was prolific. By the time he died in 1994 at age 73, he'd penned more than three dozen books, and European fans were making pilgrimages to get skunked on beer and wine with him.

With the ocean of booze, self-degradation and barely suppressed violence predictably came a chorus line of well-heeled sycophants. ``Born Into This'' has rock singer Bono, actor Sean Penn and Schroeder trumpeting oft-told tales of drunken debacles spent with Bukowski, who at one point is caught on film kicking the living daylights out of a lover before the camera mercifully turns away.

With self-mythology his biggest talent, Bukowski was marketed (we use the term loosely) in the '70s as a ``skid-row poet'' whose prose rose like a noxious gas from downtown streets; manifestos from society's forgotten corners.

But Dullaghan's film inadvertently reveals a different truth: Bukowski clung to a snug little post office job for 15 years, living (and drinking) in genteel neighborhoods, always accompanied by a deeply deluded live-in female patron whose purpose apparently was to help float his financial boat.

After sitting through ``Born Into This,'' it's hard to imagine this self- styled poet of depravity's depths, with his imported beer and tobacco, navigating, for example, San Julian Street, the real nadir of L.A.'s civic inferno.

If he had, Bukowski might not have made it as far as he did.

Fred Shuster, [phone]

fred.shuster(at)dailynews.com

BUKOWSKI: BORN INTO THIS - One and one half stars

Director: John Dullaghan.

Running time: 2 hr. 1 min.

Playing: Landmark's Nuart, West Los Angeles.

In a nutshell: Documentary about the Los Angeles ``skid-row'' poet is a grueling experience.