Themes: Starting Over, Fish Out of Water, Unlikely Friendships
Main Cast: Marianne Sägebrecht, CCH Pounder, Jack Palance, Christine Kaufmann, Monica Calhoun
Release Year: 1987
Country: US/WG
Run Time: 91 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG
Plot
This West German film is set in the California Desert. A husband-and-wife pair of Bavarian tourists become stranded when their car breaks down; after a quarrel, the wife, Marianne Sagebrecht, gathers her luggage and stalks off. She stops at the Bagdad Cafe, a fleapit truckstop run by outspoken C.C.H. Pounder, who is also having husband problems. The Cafe has become a magnet for some of truly odd character: temperamental Hispanic cook George Aguilar, tattoo artist Christine Kaufmann, and onetime Hollywood set designer Jack Palance. Despite obvious personality differences, Sagebrecht and Pounder become friends. Bagdad Cafe was later adapted into a short-lived American sitcom starring Jean Stapleton and Whoopi Goldberg. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
A cross between an existential European character study and a giddy Hollywood musical, Percy Adlon's desert fantasy introduced the offbeat character actress Marianne Sägebrecht to English-speaking audiences and revitalized the career of Hollywood veteran Jack Palance. Adlon presents his truck stop as a metaphor for the washed-up hopes of those cast aside by America, whether by discrimination and economic hardship (C.C.H. Pounder's caustic Brenda) or by the times (Palance's cowboy/artist relic Rudi). The variety show that brings the motley crew together and affirms their status as an odd extended family would be embarrassing were it not for the film's arid, deadpan humor. Without resorting to the precious, Bagdad Cafe achieves the kind of elation one can get from a great musical. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide
Darron Flagg - Sal Junior; George Aguilar - Cahuenga; G. Smokey Campbell - Sal; Hans Stadlbauer - Munchgstettner; Apesanahkwat - Sheriff Arnie; Alan S. Craig - Eric; Baby Ashley - Herself; Mark Daneri - Trucker Mark; Ronald Lee Jarvis - Trucker Ron; Gary Lee Davis - Trucker Gary; Ray Young - Trucker Ray
Credit
Bernt Amadeus Capra - Art Director, Byrnadette di Santo - Art Director, Al Onorato - Casting, Eleonore Adlon - Co-producer, Percy Adlon - Co-producer, Regine Batz - Costume Designer, Liz Warner - Costume Designer, Percy Adlon - Director, Norbert Herzner - Editor, Bob Telson - Composer (Music Score), Lee Breuer - Songwriter, Bob Telson - Songwriter, Lizbeth Williamson - Makeup, Bernt Amadeus Capra - Production Designer, Bernd Heinl - Cinematographer, Percy Adlon - Screen Story, Eleonore Adlon - Screenwriter, Percy Adlon - Screenwriter, Christopher Doherty - Screenwriter, Johann Sebastian Bach - Featured Music
Bagdad Café (also known as Out of Rosenheim) is a 1987 Germanfilm directed by Percy Adlon. The film runs 95 minutes in the U.S. and 108 minutes in the German version.
The film is a surreal comedy set in a remote truck-stop café and motel in the Mojave Desert. The film begins when German tourist Jasmin (Sägebrecht) has a fight with her husband whilst they are driving across the desert. She storms out of the car and happens upon the truck stop run by the tough-as-nails but short tempered Brenda (Pounder), whose own husband, after an argument out front, is soon to leave her too.
The cafe is visited by an assortment of colourful characters, including strange ex-Hollywood set-painter (Palance), glamorous tattoo artist (Kaufmann), topped off with a melodious backdrop in the form of J.S. Bach preludes recited on piano by Brenda's son (Darron Flagg). With an ability to quietly empathize with everyone she meets at the cafe, helped by a passion for cleaning and performing magic tricks, Jasmin gradually transforms the café and all the people in it.
In 1990 the film was turned into a television series starring James Gammon, Whoopi Goldberg, Cleavon Little, and Jean Stapleton, with Stapleton as Jasmin and Goldberg as Brenda. In the TV version, Jasmin was no longer German. The series was shot in the conventional sitcom format, before a studio audience. The show did not obtain a sizable audience, being forced to compete with ABC's Top 20 hit Family Matters and was cancelled after one season.
Bagdad, California is the original setting (Bagdad, Arizona is an unrelated town). There was an actual Bagdad Cafe that existed in the '60s when U.S. Route 66 ran through the town; it (and the town) have since vanished. The site is marked by a railroad siding and a single tree.
The film was shot at what was then the Sidewinder Cafe in Newberry Springs, California, 50 miles west of the original site of Bagdad on old U.S. 66. Since then, the café has become something of a tourist destination, and has changed its name to the Bagdad Café. A small notice board on the café wall features snapshots of the film's cast and crew.
The soundtrack album has a track where the director narrates the story, including the film's missing scenes.
The two principal piano pieces performed by Darron Flagg are the C Major Prelude No. 1 and D Major Prelude No. 5 from J.S. Bach'sThe Well Tempered Clavier.
At the begining the film, the director Percy Adlon make honors to the director of photography, showing his shadow at the same time as his name.
