Grade: C+ | Genre: Drama/Romance
Summary: John Fante's, Ask The Dust is a 1939, hipster's novel that is lost in translation to the big screen, confirming to me again, that some literature should be left to the ancient art of reading.

Directed and adapted to the screen by Chinatown scribe, Robert Towne, Ask the Dust, follows the life and loves of an aspiring Depression-era author, Arturo Bandini (Colin Farrell) as he makes his way in Los Angeles, while becoming involved with a Mexican waitress (Salma Hayek). Arturo is a second-generation Italian, who dreams of landing a writing career and a hot blue-eyed blonde on his arm, while Camilla Lopez, the intense and fiery Mexican waitress, wants to marry someone wealthy and above her station. So what do they do? Of course, this couple runs headlong into a love/hate affair that is filled with angst and racial conflicts. This folks, is the entire film, honest. Director Robert Towne, who possesses a huge fascination with old Los Angeles and has done well in sharing that image onscreen in this film, reportedly spent years bringing this cool, celebrated novel to the screen after meeting the author of this book in the 1970s.