Roadrunner – The relentless search for meaning

Earlier this year I wrote a blog that in hindsight was nothing more than a thinly disguised piece of hero worship, masquerading as a book review. The subject was the late, great Anthony Bourdain’s posthumous release, World Travel, put together by his long time collaborator Laurie Woolever.

Not long after its release, the Bourdain documentary Roadrunner hit cinemas in the US and has now finally arrived in Australia. For non-Victorians it’s important to understand that after nearly two years of lockdowns, something as simple as getting back to the movies is a godsend, so when retail and cinemas opened their doors again at 6pm yesterday (Friday 29^th October), Lynda and I entered the Lido Cinema in Hawthorn at 6.01pm for the 6.25pm session.

In typical Covid form, the film had three ‘non starts’ due to projector problems and we had to leave with an apologetic complimentary pass from the cinema. Utterly shattered, we checked the phone in the vain hope it was showing somewhere else. Thankfully we locked into a 7.45pm session at the stunning art deco Balwyn Cinema and life was good again.

During the lockdown this year I read World Travel, containing his written memoirs and travel tips from the TV series Parts Unknown, watched nine seasons of Parts Unknown (three to go) and read his classic best selling book Kitchen Confidential. Obsessed? My daughters think so but what I gleaned from the documentary is that Bourdain was much the same as you or I.

Most of my closest friends have that quiet obsession about them. Whether it’s music, films, books, footy or art, they are often encyclopaedic in their knowledge of different subjects and are open to hearing about other’s obsessions. It makes for interesting, robust conversations and Bourdain oozed that quality with whoever he met in Parts Unknown.

For a ‘Boudain-aholic’ like myself the first half of the film didn’t offer up many fresh insights, however it’s put together as a nice mosaic complete with plenty of previously unseen footage particularly early in his culinary life. What can be annoying at times in documentaries is the over use of interviews conducted with friends and colleagues of the subject.

In Roadrunner this is treated fairly and I felt the comments from those interviewed didn’t take over the film. If anything the raw emotion from the guests was palpable and only added to the disbelief of what was Bourdain’s final act.

Not a lot of attention was paid to Bourdain’s first wife Nancy whom he spent the best part of thirty years with. Given they were on the bones of their backsides for the majority of that time in New York, it was Nancy who encouraged her husband to follow his writing dream and subsequently end up with a New York Times best seller. I would have enjoyed hearing more from her but perhaps she declined.

More time was focussed on the next two loves of his life, Otavia, a mixed martial artist and mother of his daughter Ariane, and actor/director Asia whom he met shortly after the nine year marriage to Otavia ended. It was 2016 and it would be a cathartic couple of years from there up until his death in 2018.

This is where I was unaware of the nature of his relationship with Asia. It’s complex and you need to see the film to judge for yourself just how much of this relationship contributed to his eventual suicide. Ultimately as one of the guests says, taking his life was solely his responsibility and Tony wouldn’t have disagreed with that.

Bourdain travelled 250 days a year for many years. As much as I love travel and understand the privileges he would have been accustomed to, it must have been mentally debilitating at times. For all his confident façade, he was a quiet and introspective person by nature. What seems to come through in the film is his apparent lack of self-confidence and the disbelief that anyone loved him. This of course is quite the contrary.

Parts Unknown is a truly amazing series. It has little to do with the food despite being a gastronomic utopia, more-so it’s the man himself with that innate curiosity that drives the show, accompanied by the most beautiful cinematography imaginable.

There is a moment late in the last series of Parts Unknown, and captured in Roadrunner, when Bourdain inexplicably fires his cameraman of ten years, the same man who captured those aforementioned spectacular images. He also gets caught up, again obsessively, in Asia’s rape case against Harvey Weinstein and the subsequent ‘Me Too’ movement. Sadly, it’s downhill from there.

Anthony Bourdain joins the likes of great artists, writers, musicians and sports people who without their flaws, wouldn’t have made them as prolific and compelling as they were.

Roadrunner is directed by Oscar winning director Morgan Neville who directed the delightful Twenty Feet From Stardom. Yes, it’s heartbreaking especially if you’re a died in the wool fan, but it’s also a fine celebration of Bourdain’s career and I did feel as though I got to know him more intimately as the film grew. It’s currently showing in selected independent cinemas and on some streaming services. Here’s the trailer.