Who Was Jerzy Kosinski?

When I was an impressionable twentysomething, I confess that the works of the late Jerzy Kosinski (The Painted Bird, Being There, Blind Date, Cockpit) held a certain fascination: seduction, domination, betrayal...how sadistically romantic! Now that I'm a grown-up, many of Kosinski's later novels, in particular, strike me as the fantasies of a perverse dork. Purportedly a portrait of the author, Jack Kuper's documentary wheels out the traditional stories about Kosinski's legendary paranoia, murky past history, tendency to plagiarize, etc. Given this last characteristic, it's not surprising that Kuper's real focus is not on who Jerzy Kosinki was but on what he did to Jack Kuper (purportedly crib from his Child of the Holocaust to write The Painted Bird). The evidence--as presented by Kuper--is uneven, at best, but the filmmaking (wandering camera eye accompanied by purple narration) is decidedly annoying. Commenting on a slam of Kosinski in the Village Voice, the narrator intones, "I reveled in God's punishment of him; it was only just." Most libraries can skip this airing of a personal chip on Kuper's shoulder. Not recommended. Aud: C, P. (R. Pitman)