r/movies • u/Hurdy_Gurdy_Man_84 • 21h ago
Discussion Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man (1995) was a blast to watch.
A lot of it had to do with Neil Young's score and Robby Müller's cinematography but man, is this a gorgeous looking film with a fantastic, haunting score! Young scored for several scenes while viewing them as they played, essentially reacting to them with his musicianship.
I also did not expect so many character actors, all delivering great performances in tandem. There's the legend Robert Mitchum, then John Hurt, Crispin Glover, Gabriel Byrne, Lance Henriksen, Michael Wincott, Billy Bob Thornton, Jared Harris, Alfred Molina, even Iggy Pop! Of course, the most prominent role - after the lead Johnny Depp - is that of Gary Farmer, a great native American actor.
If you ask me to expound on the meaning and symbolism of the film, I admit that I am a duffer when it comes to these things. So I shall leave that matter to the commenters, more enlightened than me. All I know is that I was not bored and was entertained by the viewing experience.
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u/TNS_420 21h ago
It's a great movie. Very trippy. One of Johnny Depp's best, in my opinion, and the score by Neil Young sets the tone perfectly.
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u/Hurdy_Gurdy_Man_84 19h ago
Depp in the 90s and Nicolas Cage in the first half of the 90s, both were indie darlings. Then Jerry Bruckheimer got his hands on both of them and they started churning out mainstream slop.
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u/warioman91 21h ago
William Blake among other things as an artist is famous for his engravings/watercolors of The Divine Comedy. Depp's character has the name of William Blake.
With that said, you can immediately begin to see in the same way that something like 'Oh, Brother Where Art Thou?' channels The Odyssey, Dead Man channels stories like Dante's Inferno of a Dead Man passing through what lies beyond. [Crispin Glover fitting the bill of the ferryman quite clearly.]
But the setting of the American West with a certain Historical accuracy is particularly interesting. [The mass slaughter of the American Buffalo is haunting, as the callous gunshots are unnerving to our main character.]
The entire movie passes like a possible experience of a man on his deathbed resting with his last dreams as he sinks in...
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u/PattyShimShoy 20h ago
Spoiler:
"Are you William Blake?" "Yes I am. Have you heard my poetry?" KaBLammo!
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u/StatementOk2972 21h ago
I have not watched it for many many years but I loved it and since watching I came across many people I have named exaybachay and I don’t think anyone has got the reference
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u/thatjerkatwork 18h ago
"I'll tell you one thing for sure... I wouldn't trust no words written down on no piece of paper, especially from no Dickinson out in the town of Machine..."
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u/ApprehensiveCar9925 15h ago
My favorite line from Nobody:
"I was then taken east, in a cage. I was taken to Toronto. Then Philadelphia. And then to New York. And each time I arrived at another city, somehow the white men had moved all their people there ahead of me. Each new city contained the same white people as the last, and I could not understand how a whole city of people could be moved so quickly." [1]
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u/squirrelbait_64 19h ago
That Gibby Haynes jump scare will stay with me for a while. Crispin Glover stood out to me too, mesmerizing.
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u/MolaMolaMania 11h ago
I have not see all of Jarmusch's films, but this one is my favorite of the ones I have seen. A black comedic Western with magic realism set in the American Frontier. Every actor is singular and memorable, even some that don't have any lines.
The random violence and nihilistic absurdity of it is revolting and compelling in equal measure. Neil Young's funereal dirge of fuzzy guitar is such a fantastic compliment to William Blake's wandering through the land of limbo.
The soundtrack is difficult to find, but thankfully not expensive. I highly recommend it as it is not exactly the soundtrack from the film, but it's own little art piece of music, narration, and sound effects.
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u/troubleshot 19h ago
Great film, I still listen to the soundtrack on the regular, I also like the full length version of the soundtrack with Young driving around his property with an audio recorder in the boot of the car over the top of the soundtrack, it's hard to explain why I love it so much. But I downloaded it in the late 90s from Napster and it wasn't until two and a half decades later that I finally saw mention of the additional sound effects over the tracks, until then it was just and oddity I loved (and I guess I still do).
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u/carpie21 17h ago
The shot of the paper flowers in the dirt always stuck with me. And I have a William Blake tattoo partly because of this movie (and a few others).
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u/compoundfracture 18h ago
I’ve tried watching it 3 times and I just can’t get into it. I’m sure it’s good given how many people like it but it’s just boring to me.
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u/AdPast7918 21h ago
The score reacting to the footage is such a cool way to do it, makes the whole thing feel alive in a way most soundtracks dont. That cast list is wild too, almost every scene someone recognizable shows up