Mystery Train

Director: Jim Jarmusch Jim Jarmusch

Overview

Written and directed by the ever-unpredictable Jim Jarmusch, Mystery Train is comprised of three short anecdotes involving foreign tourists in Tennessee. Each story is set in a fleabag Memphis hotel which has been redressed as a "tribute" to Elvis Presley. Story one involves two Japanese tourists whose devotion to '50s American rock music blinds them to everything around them. Story two finds eternal victim Luisa (Nicoletta Braschi) sharing a room with stone-broke Dee Dee (Elizabeth Bracco) and having her problems solved by a spectral vision of the King. And story three offers the further misadventures of Dee Dee, her no-good boyfriend, and her dysfunctional family.

Product Details

Release Date:	03/21/2010
UPC:	0715515058810
Original Release:	1989
Source:	Criterion Collection
Region Code:	A
Presentation:	[Wide Screen]
Sound:	[Dolby Digital Mono]
Time:	1:50:00
Sales rank:	11,602

Special Features

New, restored high-definition digital transfer, supervised and apporved by director Jim Jarmusch, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack; Q&a with Jarmusch in which he responds to questions sent in by fans; Excerpts from the 2001 documentary Screamin' Jay Hawkins : I Put a Spell on Me; Original documentary on the film's locations and the rich social and music history of Memphis; On-set photos by Masayoshi Sukita and behind-the-scenes photos; New and improved English subtitle translation; Plus: a booklet featuring essays by writers Dennis Lim and Peter Guralnick

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Masatoshi Nagase	Jun
Youki Kudoh	Mitzuko
Nicoletta Braschi	Luisa
Screamin' Jay Hawkins	Night Clerk
Elizabeth Bracco	Dee Dee
Cinqué Lee	Bellboy
Joe Strummer	Johnny
Rufus Thomas	Man in Station
Rick Aviles	Will Robinson
Sy Richardson	News Vendor
Tom Noonan	Man in Diner
Stephen Jones	The Ghost
Steve Buscemi	Charlie
Vondie Curtis-Hall	Ed
Tom Waits	Radio D.J/Voice
Joshua Elvis Hoch	Tourist Studio Guide,Tourist Family
Jodie Markell	Sun Studio Guide
William Hoch	Tourist Family
Pat Hoch	Tourist Family
Reginald Freeman	Conductor
Beverly Prye	Streetwalker
Lowell Roberts	Lester
Sara Driver	Airport Clerk
Richard Boes	Second Man in Diner
Darryl Daniel	Waitress
Calvin Brown	Pedestrian
Jim Stark	Pall Bearer
Elan Yaari	Pall Bearer
Royale Johnson	Earl
Winston Hoffman	Wilbur
Marvell Thomas	Dave, Pool Player
Charles Ponder	Pool Player
D'Army Bailey	Pool Player
Karen Longwell	Actor
Rockets Redglare	Liquor Store Clerk

Technical Credits

Jim Jarmusch

Jim Jarmusch	Director,Screenwriter
Dan Bishop	Production Designer
Dianna Freas	Set Decoration/Design
Kathie Hersch	Production Manager
Kunijiro Hirata	Executive Producer
Jim Stark	Producer
Gary King	Special Effects
Robert Laden	Makeup
Melody London	Editor
John Lurie	Score Composer
Demetra J. Macbride	Associate Producer
Robby Müller	Cinematographer
Rudd Simmons	Producer
Meredith Soupios	Makeup
Hideaki Suda	Executive Producer
Carol Wood	Costumes/Costume Designer

Editorial Reviews

The Memphis of Jim Jarmusch's Mystery Train is as eerily empty as a ghost town, an appropriate setting for a movie haunted by the specter of Elvis. His music, image, and spirit is a common thread running through the film's trio of loosely connected vignettes. Flavored by Jarmusch's trademark wit and enhanced by Robbie Müller's gorgeous color cinematography, all three stories explore the experiences of various foreigners in this quintessentially American landscape. There are teenage Japanese lovebirds with a fetish for Memphis music legends, an Italian widow passing through town with her recently deceased husband (in a casket), and a despondent, recently jilted British expatriate (former Clash lead singer Joe Strummer). As usual, Jarmusch loads the supporting cast with a wide array of cool weirdos. Screamin' Jay Hawkins plays the night manager of the fleabag hotel where all the characters end up, Steve Buscemi is a local barber, and Tom Waits supplies the voice of the late-night DJ who is heard throughout the film. Like Jarmusch's haunting Stranger than Paradise and hilarious Down By Law, Mystery Train is a film about hip aimlessness; but even more than that, it is a loving valentine to American pop culture.

Barnes & Noble - Gregory Baird

Mystery Train is one of Jim Jarmusch's wittiest and most perceptive examinations of how America looks to outsiders, as a variety of visitors, from overseas and out of town, arrive in Memphis, the birthplace of rockabilly music, Sun Records, and Elvis Presley, whose high-octane music and languid rhythms make it seem exotic even to folks from neighboring states. To a young Japanese couple (Masatoshi Nagase and Youki Kudoh), Memphis is a promised land, where their heroes Elvis and Carl Perkins once walked, and their awe overwhelms their romantic problems. To an Italian widow (Nicoletta Braschi), it's a place of loss yet new hope, as the spirit of Elvis appears to comfort her. And to Johnny (Joe Strummer), the rockabilly-coiffed small-time crook from England, Memphis is a place of excitement, danger, and contradiction, as guns keep going off at the wrong times and the city's largely African-American population must keep confronting the legacy of a white man who became famous playing black music. Mystery Train never resolves the contradictions of Memphis (and, by extension, America), instead revelling in them and finding beauty and wonder in their inexplicabilities -- in Jarmusch's world, as good a reason as any for staying.

All Movie Guide - Mark Deming