Directed by:
Jim JarmuschScreenplay:
Jim JarmuschCinematography:
Frederick ElmesCast:
Adam Driver, Golshifteh Farahani, Nellie, Barry Shabaka Henley, William Jackson Harper, Chasten Harmon, Kara Hayward, Sterling Jerins, Luis Da Silva Jr. (more)Plots(1)
Paterson is a bus driver and part time aficionado poet. Each day he keeps a simple routine: he drives his bus, walks his dog, goes to a bar and drinks a beer. His only daily engagement is with writing poems, while living a beautiful love story with his partner. The most recent movie by Jim Jarmusch is developed in the course of a week and pays homage to the poet William Carlos Williams. It is about a celebration of the quiet triumphs and loses of the daily life, that finds poetry in the little things. (Interior XIII)
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Reviews (10)
It's kind of everyday poetry. This film flows so pleasantly, there is nothing overdone, there are no deep overwrought emotions (even the unpleasant event in the end is accepted by the main character with stoic calmness) and Paterson's poems, some of which I really liked, float above it all. The whole thing is thrown into a kind of chill-out mode, as Paterson slowly and deliberately recites his poems, the story flows quietly and is very nice to watch. And Adam Driver is a great actor. Great. He’s wasted in the Star Wars circus (even Scorsese has figured that out).
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A pleasant contemplation of things we've all seen somewhere else. Paterson won’t have us walking around the world with more verve and composing poems to everything that flashes in front of us, but seeing each day as unique and worthy of a friendly visit to a restaurant is something Jarmusch reassures us of with every endearing line and quirky human character. Paterson isn't the answer, it's a recommended guide to reading life.... and not a bad one at that.
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Simply a beautiful film about how nice and how sad it is sometimes to be human. Jim Jarmusch doesn't play on unnecessarily heightened emotions, whether positive or negative, but rather on those that can resonate with us, ones we can experience similarly to the great Adam Driver, whom hopefully we'll see more often in similar roles.
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Paterson is the Jeanne Dielman of post-industrial America. Jarmusch has always been able to get to the essence of the story, whether he is shooting a western (Dead Man) or a vampire love story (Only Lovers Left Alive). In his latest film, he peeled away all of the unnecessary layers of a “slice of life” drama about the life of a working man and shot a film that flows naturally, as the protagonist, form and style are in perfect harmony. Paterson loves the poetry of William Carlos Williams and his ordinary life, giving him the certainty that he will wake up tomorrow morning next to his beloved girlfriend, eat cereal with milk and set off to drive his number 23 bus. Thanks to the fact that he spends most of the day driving on autopilot, he can occasionally switch into poetic mode and come up with a few new verses about, for example, a matchbox. ___ In the same free verses, Paterson reflects the reality around him, as if the whole film were being narrated. This does not involve a series of causally interconnected events, one following the other and leading to a set goal. Variations and contrasts are essential. When Paterson meets a girl after work, it is an unexpected encounter, and we wonder what will come of it. When he wakes up in bed alone, we are interested in knowing where Laura is. Paterson maintains a Zen-like calm, giving the impression of a man from the early 1900s (when people didn’t use mobile telephones and computers) and he has no intention of changing his routine. Conversely, Laura is action-oriented and comes up with something new every day. ___ Some motifs are not developed at all (the kidnapping of a dog, the chess tournament), while Jarmusch focuses on others only for our amusement (the tipped-over mailbox). The result is simply not as important to him as the process of creation, which is captured, in the case of Paterson’s poems, by words gradually appearing on the screen. The search is more important than whether we find something. ___ The visual rhythm, expressed in the two-tone scenery and the dresses that Laura makes, in the repetition of a limited spectrum of shot compositions and editing techniques, and in other instances of doubling (the twins, the similarity between Laura and the heroine of Island of Lost Souls), helps to transform what we see and what is outwardly so ordinary into something poetic and unique, even without the aid of symbols and stylistic ornamentation. The same logic is applied to all human life in the final conversation with the Japanese tourist. ___ You can work as a doctor or drive a bus and still be a poet. All it takes is to not strive for something at all costs, to not chase after something (because then you will just be disappointed that things didn’t turn out the way you had imagined) and accept the stimuli that the world around you has to offer. Then you will begin to discover poetry in the commonplace, the everyday, the obvious. Jarmusch managed to embody this almost Buddhist wisdom in the structure of the film and make it universally comprehensible. In its simplicity, which is reminiscent of Ozu and Bresson, Paterson is an incredibly powerful film whose message is far greater than the sum of what happens in it. 90%
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Now you will finally see me for what I am! I'm clearly not smart enough to appreciate Paterson. I just don’t find it interesting to watch the day-to-day life of a bus driver with poetic inclinations and his extremely creative wife. I was so supremely bored that I almost nodded off twice, but I fought it until the bitter end. I thought I'd give Jim Jarmusch a call. His next movie could be about me. It would surely be just as boring, maybe even more so, which would certainly kick it up a notch in terms of quality. The bus breaking down sure gave the story a new edge and brought an incredible amount of suspense. Ugh…
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