Who Is Bozo Texino? (NR)

synopsis

"Who is Bozo Texino?" is a film on the 100-year-old tradition of hobo and railworker graffiti. The project is the result of a 20-year study of "monikers" and is fabricated from hours of 16mm and super 8 film, most of it shot on freight trips across the western United States. The film includes interviews with some of the railroad's greatest graffiti legends: Colossus of Roads, The Rambler, Herby (RIP) and the granddaddy of them all, Bozo Texino. The film also catches some of the socioeconomic history of hobo subculture from its roots after the Civil War to the present day. Included are interviews with tramps that Daniel encountered in his travels. The film's range of the interviews and its style deal both with the clichés and the harsh realities of tramp life. In researching hobo culture, Daniel found the written histories fraught with myth and was initially frustrated by the apparent lack of verifiable truth to much of the lore.