Night on Earth [Region 2] | Gena Rowlands, Winona Ryder

Night on Earth [Region 2] | Gena Rowlands, Winona Ryder | Global Jarmusch

DVDs:

Night on Earth [Re...

	Night on Earth [Region 2] Gena Rowlands, Winona Ryder average customer review:based on 60 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

A Great Night on Earth

I watched this film late at night, when every sane person is supposed to be asleep, out of their cars and in their beds. Life still goes on, however, for the taxi-drivers who move people from one quiet location to another in the wee hours of the night. The locations are quiet, but the people are not, and the dialogue in this movie is humorous, meaningful, and real. A temporary bond is formed between passenger and driver (sometimes the roles are even reversed, as in the New York vignette featuring Helmut Grokenberger and YoYo, played by Armin Mueller-Stahl and Giancarlo Esposito, respectively). Armin Mueller-Stahl, born in 1930, may be relatively unknown to American audiences (as opposed to, say, Rosie Perez), but he did play Vertikoff in the George Clooney flick "The Peacemaker" (1997). Who is the stranger at the wheel who is responsible for bringing one home? What kind of person drives late at night, waiting for the dispatcher's call to a new address? A passenger has to pay him or her at the end of the ride, but there is still a feeling of gratitude, and even affection, towards this gruff conveyor of souls. "You're a good man, Mika," the half-drunk, initially hostile, Finnish workers tell their driver (played by Matti Pellonpää) at the end of their journey. Or a battle of wits takes place, as evidenced by the Paris vignette. Ivorian actor Isaach De Bankolé (who also appears in Jim Jarmusch's "Coffee and Cigarettes") is great here as a luckless "taxiste" whose prying questions are turned against him by his blind passenger (played by Béatrice Dalle). Roberto Benigni is of course hilarious, and does here what he does best: rapid, hilarious dialogue with a lot of gesticulation and wide grins. He and the actor who plays the priest (not a bishop), Paolo Bonacelli, have been co-stars before: on the Benigni vehicle "Johnny Stecchino."
I am really looking forward to the time when "Night on Earth" is made available on DVD.

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Global Jarmusch

I caught Night on Earth on cable TV. I want this DVD! I'll be watching it over and over with my friends. It's funny and entertaining, reflexive and whimsical in a mixture that became Jim Jarmusch's signature. These are five vignettes that take place in taxi cabs, each in a different place on Earth: LA, NY, Paris, Rome, and Helsinki. Each tells a story that extracts the essence of each location using actors and language of the place. For instance, the Rome episode has Roberto Benigni (of the Wonderful World fame) driving a cab in the night-time Rome. He picks up a Catholic priest, and makes him listen to the confession about his sexual adventures. The story is so funny and the delivery so masterful that you end up rolling on the floor with laugs. A definite keeper!

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Where's the dvd????

I'm a serious Jarmusch fan, love all his films, yes even Dead Man. But Night on Earth to me is his strongest effort. So can anyone tell me what the freaking story is about releasing this on dvd??? All the rest are out, so what exactly is the problem? I have a hotshot new tv that craves dvd. My videotape is wearing out. Hey, you dudes out their in movie-rights land, get off your butts and let us have this on dvd...

Jarmusch's best??

A director like Jarmusch who has such a consistant and strong visual and thematic style will necessarily tend to draw either strongly positive or strongly negative responses. You either think he's the greatest or you think it's a bunch of junk. For my money he's one of the best. Always visually very fine, serious in his look at the modern world, and so often funny at the same time. In fact maybe it's just the combination of aesthetic and philosophical high seriousness with humor that makes much of his work so satisfying, and of course links him with his main, to my mind, counterparts the Coen brothers. Of course in saying this I immediately place myself as more a fan of Down By LAw, Mystery Train, and Night on EArth, than his other less comic films. Anyway, if I had to choose I'd take Night on Earth as the one I most enjoy. Like his other films it really repays viewing many times. When are they going to release the thing on DVD??

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from stereo-types to awareness

what a clever way to expose stereotypes--or should i say stereo types as in spatial/geographic types!

the viewer is also made aware of the imensity of life on earth for one usually overlooks most other and separate experiences except that in this movie 5 of such experiences are being considered quasi-simultaneously.

acting is very good and complements well the twentysome- minute stories.

reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, page 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

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