“BROKEN FLOWERS” (2005)

Starring: Bill Murray, Jeffrey Wright, Sharon Stone, Alexis Dziena, Frances Conroy, Jessica Lange, Tilda Swinton, Chloë Sevigny & Julie Delpy
Written & Directed by Jim Jarmusch

Polly Staffle Rating: *

Jim Jarmusch makes interesting films. It's too bad he doesn't make interesting films that are good. He almost got there with his Johnny Depp western “Dead Man” and was close again with Forest Whititaker in “Ghost Dog: The Way of The Samurai.” A bored out of his skull Bill Murray sees to it “Broken Flowers” carries on the Jarmusch tradition.

Like the other two mentioned films, I wanted to like “Broken Flowers,” but didn't. It can almost be seen as a sequel to “Lost in Translation.” He is basically playing the same character. Perhaps Murray is just being himself. If that's the case, he is definitely a celebrity I would not want to spend the day with. He's depressing.

There's not much subtle about this film. Murray's character is supposed to be a ladies man, so Jarmusch names him Don Johnston. There are then at least four references to Don Juan in the first ten minutes and several more to “Miami Vice” heartthrob Don Johnson throughout the movie.

Jarmusch also uses the old boring movie gratuitous nudity trick. When a movie is going no where fast, directors love to pull this. The scene of nudity comes out of nowhere and is there, not because someone is taking a bath or shower, not because they are a nudist, not because they are a stripper, not because they are about to have sex, just because the director wants to make sure if you are falling asleep, hopefully some nudity will wake you. It doesn't make the movie any better and usually doesn't fit the film's overall tone. The slower the movie, the more clothes they take off as well.

One of the more recent examples I can think of was “Open Water.” It's an example of a really boring movie. The director decided it needed full frontal nudity. It was quick, but it's there. In “Broken Flowers” we get a fully nude young woman. Fans of Alexis Dziena will love it. You don't even have to pause the film to get a good view from front and back. And get this; the character she is playing is named Lolita. Yes, another smoothly named character by Jarmusch. (Don's next door neighbor is named Winston. Since there are Sherlock Holmes references about him in the film I bet the first draft of Jarmusch's script has that character named Watson.)

The plot of “Broken Flowers” has Johnston heading on a cross country trip to find out who's the mother of his son. He receives a letter from an unknown sender with a smudged post mark that he has a 19-year-old child he has no clue he ever fathered. Through the prodding of Winston, Johnston narrows the possibilities of who may have sent the letter to him down to five women. Johnston heads on a trip to talk with them.

Lolita is the daughter of one of the former girlfriends. She appears nude in front of Johnston to show us how irresistible he is and what a ladies man he is. But Murray doesn't appear to be a stud at all in the film. He doesn't appear to be anything. He is told in one scene that he understands women. If he understands them so well, how come he can't keep a woman? Why is his current girlfriend leaving him as the film opens? If he is the pimp, why are there only five possible mothers? If he is so Rico Suave how come he hardly ever talks to any of the women in the film? And why is it such a surprise he may have a child? Most Don Juan's could field a football team.

By the end of this movie, we don't know any more about Johnston then we did before the opening credits. We see he is lonely and he wasted any chance he had of having a family.

The more I ponder the film, the less I like it. I keep asking myself question you don't ask when a film is good. Why did I waste time finishing it? How the hell did it make any best of 2005 lists? But more importantly, when did the critics start loving Bill Murray?

That's right, Murray turned fifty a few years back so now they are allowed to like him. What is the deal that the older a male actor gets, the more he is acclaimed? And what does it say about our society that anything a fifty-year old actor touches is gold, as long as they are male? First, Clint Eastwood and then Jack Nicholson. Bill Murray is the new member of the club. Fifty-year old women usually have to share the limelight, if they are even allowed to be near it. Ironically, four solid actress either approaching or already in their fifties are in “Broken Flowers.” Sharon Stone, Jessica Lange, Frances Conroy and Tilda Swinton. All four are underused here playing former girlfriends of Don.

Like “Lost in Translation,” this film is sold as a comedy when it isn't. There is more humor here, but the simple fact is Murray isn't funny anymore. He used to be, but now he's just an old shell of his former self. He just sits around and mopes. If that sounds fun to you, maybe you should visit your grandfather a bit more.

My grandfathers were more fun then this guy. Even the one that was an alcoholic. He never had a good word to say about anyone. He always had the heater on full blast even in the summer time and his idea of keeping up to date with current events was sitting on the porch reading the National Enquirer. Days when he hadn't said a sentence to you otherwise, he would always ask when you were about to leave, “What's your hurry?” He was more fun than Bill Murray is in this movie.

I think Jarmusch tries too hard. He wants his films to be eccentric. I read on the Internet Movie Database that Jarmusch wrote “Broken Flowers” in two and a half weeks with Murray in mind. Maybe he should have spent at least a month on the script and wrote it with someone else in mind.

- CCF, February 2006