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Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain


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i think more than any other touchpoint, his suicide really brought home just how much discord there could be between someone's outward life and their internal struggle.

he was rich, famous, could basically have anything/anybody he wanted, do anything he wanted, had literally the most interesting, awesome job in the world...and it wasn't enough.

it was mind-boggling, at least to me. really sad.

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i think more than any other touchpoint, his suicide really brought home just how much discord there could be between someone's outward life and their internal struggle.
he was rich, famous, could basically have anything/anybody he wanted, do anything he wanted, had literally the most interesting, awesome job in the world...and it wasn't enough.
it was mind-boggling, at least to me. really sad.


Same recipe for Chris Cornell. Money and success don’t equate to happiness. Very sad.
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4 minutes ago, Buzzrock said:

Same recipe for Chris Cornell. Money and success don’t equate to happiness. Very sad.

Yeah, but for some reason, and probably unfairly, it seems less shocking with artists.  See also Kurt Cobain; Michael Hutchence.  There can be something dark and mysterious with rock stars.  Bourdain got to leave the unrelenting and cruel restaurant world and for the last decade or so of his life was paid to essentially go on vacation all over the world. 

I don't mean to say that the demons run deeper in one over the other, but as an outsider who's never experienced clinical depression, some celebrity suicides are viewed differently. 

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I went to his book tour at Bass Hall right before he started on CNN. He was excited about the move because CNN had connections and fixers he could only dream about at Travel Chan and they had much deeper pockets. Eric Ripert was there and Tony interrogated him like a prosecutor the whole time. It was hilarious. Really wish I shelled out for the backstage meet & greet but who knew he was about to die?

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Looks exploitative. I’m not sure he’d approve.

Read his book. Check out his episode of No Reservations where he visits Cleveland. Of course he does so in the dead of winter. And oddly his first stop is to Skyline Chili, a Cincinnati institution. But he shows it a lot more appreciation than you’ll find around here.

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3 hours ago, mchookem said:

he was rich, famous, could basically have anything/anybody he wanted, do anything he wanted, had literally the most interesting, awesome job in the world...and it wasn't enough.

He had an 11 year-old daughter.  That's the part that bugs me the most.  I understand some have some serious demons, but damn.

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i know what you're saying...artistic types often seem deeply haunted by something very, very dark.

or maybe it's not often, ...it just seems that way bc we know of them.

i dunno...even the ones that are 'accidental' always seem really troubled (Ledger, PSH, Phoenix, Morrison, etc) but i suppose that goes hand-in-hand with severe substance abuse.

ETA replying to South Austin

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31 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

He had an 11 year-old daughter.  That's the part that bugs me the most.  I understand some have some serious demons, but damn.

Unfortunately, some rationalize the decision by thinking the kid(s) will be better off without them.  And it can lead to serious guilt on the part of the kid(s), e.g., "What could I have done differently?" or  "Did mom/dad commit suicide because of me?"  Etc., etc.  

 I will watch this when it comes out.  I almost always found Bourdain's observations and travels to be interesting.

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1 minute ago, Carl Spackler said:

Unfortunately, some rationalize the decision by thinking the kid(s) will be better off without them.  And it can lead to serious guilt on the part of the kid(s), e.g., "What could I have done differently?" or  "Did mom/dad commit suicide because of me?"  Etc., etc.  

I've had multiple friends I knew in the Army, or from high school/college, who came back from Afghanistan/Iraq with serious PTSD issues and later committed suicide (and maybe the PTSD aggravated something that was already there).  Two (that I know of) mentioned that they were worried they might hurt their kids, or that their kids were better off remembering them a certain way, rather than what they thought they were becoming.  One mentioned it in a suicide note, the other to a counselor.

As a parent with young kids, that stuff just devastates me, because I know they actually believed the kids would be better off without them, but that was not the case, and at some point their kids will probably hear that stuff.

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Art and mental illness/depression have always been intertwined. Appreciating and cooking food at the level that Bourdain did is an artistic endeavor so it's similar to any painter or musician.

As someone who deals with similar demons, it doesn't matter one bit of difference how one's external life is doing. It's the internal darkness that never lifts. Trying to explain that to someone that's never experienced the affliction is almost impossible. Top of the world is the same as the bottom of the barrel when your mind won't cooperate.

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2 hours ago, WhatTheBuck said:

Looks exploitative. I’m not sure he’d approve.

Read his book. Check out his episode of No Reservations where he visits Cleveland. Of course he does so in the dead of winter. And oddly his first stop is to Skyline Chili, a Cincinnati institution. But he shows it a lot more appreciation than you’ll find around here.

So he ate Skyline Chili and then offed himself?  I can see that.

In all seriousness I was a big fan (read his books/watched all his shows) and it sucks what he was battling with mentally.  I may be wrong but didn't he kill himself over that Italian chick he was dating.  Did she break up with him or something.  I can't recall but I think that is what supposedly made him kill himself.  Then again, don't count out having to eat Skyline Chili and act like its good.

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24 minutes ago, Beantown Express 2.0 said:

So he ate Skyline Chili and then offed himself?  I can see that.

In all seriousness I was a big fan (read his books/watched all his shows) and it sucks what he was battling with mentally.  I may be wrong but didn't he kill himself over that Italian chick he was dating.  Did she break up with him or something.  I can't recall but I think that is what supposedly made him kill himself.  Then again, don't count out having to eat Skyline Chili and act like its good.

IIRC the Italian chick was part of the the me too movement, but got busted banging an underage boy. Then said it was some conspiracy that Bourdain knew about but was conveniently dead at that point  

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IIRC the Italian chick was part of the the me too movement, but got busted banging an underage boy. Then said it was some conspiracy that Bourdain knew about but was conveniently dead at that point  

She is a psychopath. Weren’t there reports of her egging him on to kill himself that she had to do damage control on after his death?
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21 minutes ago, CooterBrown said:


She is a psychopath. Weren’t there reports of her egging him on to kill himself that she had to do damage control on after his death?

Asia Argento. Her dad was an Italian horror director I remember from film class which was the best elective ever. I had to google her though. She seems to get assaulted quite a bit 

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3 hours ago, Herpa Derpa said:

Art and mental illness/depression have always been intertwined. 

Are they, though, more than any other profession? Maybe we just hear about them more than we would if it was Bill in accounting?

"In today's CNN headlines, an employee at a small local business committed suicide today."

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52 minutes ago, Deej said:

Are they, though, more than any other profession? Maybe we just hear about them more than we would if it was Bill in accounting?

"In today's CNN headlines, an employee at a small local business committed suicide today."

True. I was only referring to the anecdotal history of the tortured artist. That certainly doesn't mean that depression/mental illness is confined to certain professions to the exclusions of others. 

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i think the reason it seems that way is that the ones we're thinking/talking about have reached a pretty exclusive celebrity status... and the number of people in that population is small to begin with. so the tragedies stand out a lot more, proportionally.* and these are all people that were exceptionally famous before they died. 

 

*based on no actual data, just seems logical.

 

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I read his first book when it came out, even read and enjoyed his fiction stuff and enjoyed all of his shows.  Although I new I would never agree with his politics he always seemed like someone you could have a beer with.  I'm in on the movie.

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10 hours ago, Beantown Express 2.0 said:

In all seriousness I was a big fan (read his books/watched all his shows) and it sucks what he was battling with mentally.  I may be wrong but didn't he kill himself over that Italian chick he was dating.  Did she break up with him or something.  I can't recall but I think that is what supposedly made him kill himself.  Then again, don't count out having to eat Skyline Chili and act like its good.

Of course he was just acting when it came to Skyline chili, right? Other than that you’re a big fan. Right? Lulz. Go have a ketchup sandwich then post about it in the ‘Oops, I crapped my pants’ thread.’ “Y’all” ain’t nearly as cultured and sophisticated as you like to tell yourselves you are.

I recently saw a rerun of an episode of Simply Ming that was originally supposed to be with Anthony Bourdain but, because of his passing, hosted Jacques Pépin as an emergency replacement. It was a touching tribute to Tony. You’d do well to look that up. 

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While I miss him terribly, and haven’t stopped grieving (in a way) for his loss, I also haven’t forgiven him for abandoning us.  
 

He’s also exhibit one for why emergency use of ketamine or a ketamine derivative needs to be more for extreme depression. Brain chemistry is a motherfucker.  

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22 hours ago, mchookem said:

i think more than any other touchpoint, his suicide really brought home just how much discord there could be between someone's outward life and their internal struggle.

he was rich, famous, could basically have anything/anybody he wanted, do anything he wanted, had literally the most interesting, awesome job in the world...and it wasn't enough.

it was mind-boggling, at least to me. really sad.

I’m in

I was pretty shocked too, but then all the info about his Italian girlfriend and her sexual assault case, that Anthony paid her victim in secret as she planted herself in the budding #metoo movement came out. There were also cryptic Twitter posts made by her on the night but before he died. 

I can’t speculate if that may have had anything to do with his decision, but man it sure hinted at a complex private life. 

I hope the film focuses more on his life but maybe touches on his private turmoil a little. It might help some people 

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Some Q folks think he was killed by Epstein coveruppers. I really want to understand that.  But I also really don’t. 
The trailer made it seem like one of those things where people who kinda knew him explain that he wasn’t OK.  I’m not interested in what I saw. 

No one gives a shit what those morons believe.
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1 hour ago, Deej said:

I can watch anything with Jacques cooking. 

The man is a phenomenon. Classically trained French chef. Cooked for heads of state. Came to America when our cuisine was still pretty backwoods. Asked the grocer where the mushrooms were and was directed to the canned goods aisle. Took a job developing a menu for a big corporation like Howard Johnson’s. Published a cookbook that teaches you how to cook without including a single recipe. He has knife skills that make me feel like a little child.

He can do anything. And yet there’s nothing elite about him. Check out his recipe for roasting an already-cooked ham basted with ketchup and soy sauce and whatever else. In that episode of Simply Ming he payed tribute to Bourdain by saying Tony cared as much about the simple food, the street food, and the food that someone’s grandma cooks as much as anything anyone might define as haute cuisine.

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He did an episode in PI that partially focused on Filipina mothers who leave their families to work abroad and support them, not getting the see them for years.  My wife is Filipina and her mother did the same thing...years working in Saudi Arabia then US.  In a closing bit Tony sensitively and respectfully captured the essence of that whole thing the gentle loving Filipino nature in a few minutes of narration that makes me tear up every time I see it.  He truly had a gift and I hate that he left.

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3 minutes ago, Wade said:

He did an episode in PI that partially focused on Filipina mothers who leave their families to work abroad and support them, not getting the see them for years.  My wife is Filipina and her mother did the same thing...years working in Saudi Arabia then US.  In a closing bit Tony sensitively and respectfully captured the essence of that whole thing the gentle loving Filipino nature in a few minutes of narration that makes me tear up every time I see it.  He truly had a gift and I hate that he left.

Wasn't she his au 'pair or something? I remember that episode, but not the details. She had "children" all over the world.

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8 minutes ago, RPM said:

Wasn't she his au 'pair or something? I remember that episode, but not the details. She had "children" all over the world.

I think it was his producer's, but yeah a common story across the PI.

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I can’t recall which one of Bourdain’s shows it was but there was an episode where he met a couple duck hunters who didn’t like to eat duck. He showed them how to properly cook a duck breast and they were just blown away, no pun intended.

Also, any of the shows where he was with his Russian friend were always gold. 

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I watched his Colombia and Buenos Aires episodes a few years ago. He really kind of opened himself up during the Buenos Aires episode where it was also mentioned that there were a ton of psychotherapists in that same city. I remembered wondering to myself if he had problems with depression back then. I hate that he's gone, he had undoubtedly the best job in the world.

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