Themes: Miscarriage of Justice, Escape From Prison, Down on Their Luck
Main Cast: Tom Waits, John Lurie, Roberto Benigni, Nicoletta Braschi, Ellen Barkin
Release Year: 1986
Country: US
Run Time: 107 minutes
MPAA Rating: R
Plot
Jim Jarmusch follows his groundbreaking Stranger Than Paradise with another rambling, character-driven film with a twisted sense of humor. Set in a seedy New Orleans summer, Down By Law details the meeting of three unlikely convicts and their just as unlikely escape. Zack (Tom Waits) is an out-of-work DJ who is accused of murder when a body is found in the trunk of a stolen car he was hired to drive across town. Jack (John Lurie) is a pimp set up for a fall by a competitor. These two sullen souls are locked in a cell with Roberto (Roberto Benigni), a cheerful Italian immigrant who happens to have killed a man. The chemistry between the members of this loosely bound "team" is fascinating: Zack and Jack are forever laughing at Roberto, yet they rely on his energy and good will to escape their dire situation. The three mismatched miscreants eventually bust out of jail and head into the Louisiana bayous. Tired and hungry, they separate to search for food: Waits goes one way, Lurie another, and the frightened Benigni decides to risk stepping into a ramshackle diner. Somehow or other, he winds up in the arms of gorgeous Italian girl Nicoletta Braschi -- and is even able to provide new clothes and escape routes for his astonished comrades! ~ John Voorhees, All Movie Guide
Review
Though not as critically successful as his debut, Stranger Than Paradise, director Jim Jarmusch's Down By Law is a worthy follow-up in a similar vein. It features the same deliberate rhythm, off-beat characters, deadpan humor, and emphasis on photography (by the famed German cinematographer Robby Müller). Willfully original and intensely independent, the typical Jarmusch film isn't a product that mainstream audiences are likely to enjoy. He combines his enigmatic characters with the esoteric pacing and sensibility of his peer, Wim Wenders. Down By Law is slightly more accessible than Wenders' films, however, due to the slapstick presence of Roberto Benigni. Benigni's staccato voice and mincing of English clichés are very funny, though Jarmusch occassionally lets him run on too long. Luckily, the director keeps the rest of the film generally obtuse, uncertain and interesting. ~ Brendon Hanley, All Movie Guide
One of Bill Laswell's many projects, Deadline is a collaboration with drummer Phillip Wilson -- not without the usual Laswell cohorts, of course. Down By Law is an interesting blend of industrial DMX beats and live percussion, African influences and Western funk. Saxophonist Manu Dibango pops up on half of the tracks and invokes memories of his Laswell-produced album Electric Africa.
The killer track on this album is the ten-minute-plus "Makossa Rock," which combines clever, funky rhythms, an irresistible synth bassline, Steve Turre's haunting didgeridoo, scratching-like sounds by Laswell and Robert Musso, plus solos by Dibango, bluesman Paul Butterfield on harmonica, and bass legend Jaco Pastorius. Actually, this track is so good it could play forever. The other tracks, including the abstract, percussive pieces "Gammatron" (reminding of Material's "Heritage") and "Doo Rot," never let go of their fierce rhythmic edge either. While "Makossa Rock" may be worth the price of the album alone, the other tracks should not be neglected. ~ Chris Genzel, All Music Guide
The film centers on the arrest, incarceration, and escape from jail of three men. It discards jailbreak film conventions by focusing on the interaction between the convicts rather than on the mechanics of the escape. A key element in the film is Robby Müller's slow-moving camerawork, which captures the architecture of New Orleans and the Louisianabayou to which the cellmates escape.
Three men, previously unknown to each other, are arrested in New Orleans and placed in the same cell. Both Zack, a DJ, and Jack, a pimp, have been set up, neither having committed the crime for which they have been arrested. Their cellmate Bob, an Italian tourist who understands minimal English, was imprisoned for manslaughter. Zack and Jack soon come to blows and thereafter avoid speaking to each other. Bob has an irrepressible need for conversation. He hatches a plan to escape, and before long the three are on the run through the swamp surrounding the prison. Hopelessly lost and with a simmering hatred between Jack and Zack almost causing the party to split up, they are brought together by Bob's ability to provide food. The trio eventually chance across a house in the forest, the residence of Nicoletta. Bob and Nicoletta instantly fall in love, and Bob decides to stay with her in the forest. Zack and Jack go their separate ways - an unspoken, begrudging friendship hanging between them as they part.
When Bob is sitting in the woods, roasting the rabbit over the fire, he tells stories from home and mentiones his sisters Bruna, Albertina and Anna, which are actually sisters of the actor Roberto Benigni. The names of his parents Isolina and Luigi ("Gigi") are consistent.[2]
Benigni and Nicoletta Braschi, whose characters fell in love in the movie, later got married in real life.
