I knew Jim slighly back in the day and he hit me as a distracted hipster, a distaste that left me passing on his movies a little later on. And as I've gone back and watched em, I've been both right and wrong in that decision. If you ever hear the proper nouns Jarmusch and Young in the same sentence run for the hills, but the episodic Mystery Train is really a lot of fun and even if it wasn't… Here's three reason to catch it.
1. Screaming Jay Hawkins in a red jacket.
2. Joe Strummer playing the jukebox
3. Youki Kudoh, adorable adorable adorable.
The three stories happen in and around Memphis where foreigners are visiting for a day to pay their respects to the city that Elvis built. The first couple are a sweet but clueless Japanese couple paying their respects to the rock and roll that changed their lives. The movie was released in 1989, 20 plus years after rock and roll broke so you gotta figure this would've been their childhood. Youki Kudoh as the girl is so sweet you wanna hug her, and her boyfriend Masatoshi Nagasem has a cool moodiness.
The second story, about a French tourist and a runaway wife is the worst of the free, Presley's ghost makes an appearance.
Both couples stay at the seedy hotel run by Screaming Jay Hawkins who is the best thing about the movie. The runaways husband is portrayed by Joe Strummer, a down and out Englishman in down and out Memphis. Much has been claimed about Joe's acting but I was not that impressed. Bits and pieces and it is Strummer which forgives a lot of sins, but Steve Buscemi as his brother-in-law saves the episode.
Music: A lot of it and all good. The great former Lounge Lizard John Lurie wrote the score and a double dose of Presley plus Elvis Presley, Junior Parker, Otis Redding, Roy Orbison, Rufus Thomas, Bobby Blue Bland, and the Bar-Kays
Still, "Mystery Train", a sort of decline and fall of the American Empire as seen through the eyes of strangers and refracted thru a rock and roll spectrum, is a fun ride and a smart movie. Maybe I was the distracted hipster.
Movie Grade: B+
Music Grade: A