The Dead Don't Die

Year:  2019
Director:  Jim Jarmusch
Screenplay:  Jim Jarmusch
Starring:  Bill Murray, Adam Driver, Chloë Sevigny, Tilda Swinton, Steve Buscemi, Danny Glover, Caleb Landry Jones, Selena Gomez, RZA, Iggy Pop, Tom Waits
Running Time:  103 minutes
Genre:  Horror, comedy

The small American town of Centerville is experiencing a series of bizarre events:  It gets dark either far too late or far too early for the time of year, animals are behaving out of character or disappearing, and electronic equipment is behaving very erratically.  Things get much worse when the dead start to come out of the grave and feast on the flesh of the living. 

This marks the second time that acclaimed indie director Jim Jarmusch has entered horror territory, following acclaimed vampire movie Only Lovers Left Alive (2013).  This did not get the same positive reception on it's release.  The humour is very deadpan, police officers Bill Murray and Adam Driver seem to sleepwalk throughout the entire film even before the zombies appear, and is full of bizarre touches, such as Tilda Swinton as an eccentric, samurai sword wielding Scottish mortician (with a frankly extraordinary accent), and Murray and Driver's characters seem to be aware that they are characters in a film, and the film's theme song becomes a recurring in-joke throughout the film.  It's also full of references to other horror films.  This isn't really scary at all, and at times it is too self-consciously cool for it's own good, and the characters are too "hip" and quirky to really feel realistic.  it also hammers home it's political message a little too bluntly at times.  Personally though, I did find it consistently funny.  The zombies themselves are effectively designed, "bleeding" clouds of black ash, and drawn to the things that they loved when they were alive.  It boasts an impressive cast, who all seem to be having fun.

Bill Murray, Chloë Sevigny and Adam Driver face off against zombies in The Dead Don't Die

Trees Lounge

Year of Release:  1996
Director:  Steve Buscemi
Screenplay:  Steve Buscemi
Starring:  Steve Buscemi, Chloe Sevigny, Mark Boone Junior, Anthony LaPaglia, Elizabeth Bracco, Seymour Cassel, Carol Kane, Samuel L. Jackson
Running Time:  95 minutes
Genre:  Drama, slice-of-life

In a tough, working-class neighbourhood of New York City, alcoholic Tommy Basilio (Buscemi) is a fixture at the local bar, Trees Lounge.  His girlfriend of eight years has left him for his boss and former best friend, Rob (LaPaglia).  Rob subsequently fired Tommy from his job as a mechanic for stealing money form the till.  In between drinking at the Trees Lounge, Tommy spends his time half-heartedly looking for work, eventually being given an ice-cream truck, following the death of the owner.  He also manages to form a connection with Debbie (Sevigny), the seventeen-year-old niece of a former girlfriend.

This is a downbeat, slice-of-life drama, very much in the John Cassavetes school of gritty realism, and features Cassavetes regular Seymour Cassel.  By and large the film sticks with Tommy, but it also deals with the lives of other Trees Lounge regulars, all of whom seem to lead pretty miserable lives.  Some crucial elements in the film are left ambiguous, not depicted on screen we are left to decide for ourselves what really happened from the often differing versions of events that the characters give us.  Not much happens in the film and, in keeping with the lives these characters lead, there are no real conclusions, despite glimmerings of hope it looks as if they will keep doing the same things over and over again.  This is a strong debut from Buscemi as a writer-director making largely unlikeable characters sympathetic and giving the film a strain of dark comedy.  The film has a strong cast full of recognisable faces from nineties independent movies.  The film's largely plotless nature and slow pace may put off some viewers but it is worth sticking with because it is a well-performed and well-written drama.  Buscemi scripted and directed one other film Animal Factory (2003) and has directed a number of TV episodes, but Trees Lounge really makes me which that he had done more as a writer/director because, on the evidence of this, he could have become a notable filmmaker as well as an actor.     

Steve Buscemi in Trees Lounge

Melinda and Melinda

Year of Release:  2004
Director:  Woody Allen
Screenplay:  Woody Allen
Starring:  Radha Mitchell, Chloe Sevigny, Jonny Lee Miller, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Will Ferrell, Amanda Peet, Wallace Shawn
Running Time: 95 minutes
Genre:  Comedy drama

In a Manhattan diner, four friends discuss whether life is essentially comic or tragic.  To illustrate their points two playwrights take a simple premise (an emotionally fragile woman, Melinda (Mitchell), disrupts a dinner party) and tell their own versions of what happens to her. One version plays as a tragedy, and the other as a light romantic comedy.

It is an interesting premise, the problem is that the tone is very jarring throughout, most of the film is taken up with recounting Melinda's story interweaving the two versions moving from bleak drama to frothy comedy.  Some of the film is pretty repetitive, we see the same events play out in two different versions.  Radha Mitchell plays Melinda in both stories, with Chloe Sevigny, Jonny Lee Miller and Chiwetel Ejiofor starring in the tragic story, and Will Ferrell and Amanda Peet starring in the comedy version (which also features Steve Carell in a small role as Ferrell's friend).  The performances are good for the most part, with Mitchell in particular giving a stunning performance in the central role, although Will Ferrell's performance seems to consist mainly of him doing a Woody Allen impression.  The film feels very much like a filmed play at times, it has a fairly small cast of characters and is almost entirely dialogue driven, however the tragic storyline has muted colours and a slightly dull, slightly overcast look to it, while the comic sequences are bright, vibrant and sunlit.
While this is far from Woody Allen's best films, it still has it's moments.

Will Ferrell and Radha Mitchell in Melinda and Melinda.