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Monday, December 5, 2022

DOWN BY LAW (1986)

Sui generis filmmaking from Jim Jarmusch, a cockeyed odyssey far more Homeric than the Coen Brothers’ O BROTHER, WHERE ART THOU?, which actually gave Homer a writing credit (and wouldn’t you love to have seen that contract?), here played with deadpan intensity (to coin an oxymoron) by three inspired lunatics: Tom Waits, John Lurie and Roberto Benigni.  The first two, under-employed New Orleans’ musicians who meet-not-so-cute in a filthy jail cell, each man having been set up for a fall.  One framed on an under-aged prostitution rap; the other caught driving crosstown with a dead body in the boot of the car he was driving.  Unaware of what they had gotten themselves into, they’re like prisoners waiting for Godot when Benigni is moved in, a talkative Italian with expressively limited English and a murder rap he’s more than happy to explain.  As wary friendship evolves, an impromptu plan of escape thru treacherous swamp-lands seems a good idea.  And dammed if it isn’t under the patient gaze of Jarmusch and Robby Müller’s incredibly expressive hot-house monochrome cinematography.  With long takes, minimal action (actually there’s quite a lot of action, it just seems as if nothing happens), and near magical realism, the film, with it’s leapfrogging narrative sensibility (skipping over what normal writer/directors would have made a meal of) is a one-of-a-kind wonder.  Possibly the best thing Jarmusch ever did.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Hard to watch some of the shots cruising past New Orleans houses & neighborhoods dilapidated even then, without imagining if they now survive at all after weather calamities and social indifference over the past four decades.

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