Coffee and Cigarettes
| Coffee and Cigarettes | |
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Coffee and Cigarettes film poster
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| Directed by | Jim Jarmusch |
| Produced by | |
| Written by | Jim Jarmusch |
| Starring | |
| Cinematography | |
| Edited by | |
| Distributed by | United Artists |
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Release date
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May 14, 2004 |
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Running time
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95 minutes |
| Country | USA, Japan, Italy |
| Language | English French |
| Box office | $7.9 million |
Coffee and Cigarettes is the title of three short films and a 2003 anthology film by independent film director Jim Jarmusch. The film consists of 11 short stories which share coffee and cigarettes as a common thread, and includes the earlier three short films.
The film is composed of a comic series of short vignettes shot in black and white built on one another to create a cumulative effect, as the characters discuss things such as caffeine popsicles, Paris in the 1920s, and the use of nicotine as an insecticide – all while sitting around drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes. The theme of the film is absorption in the obsessions, joys, and addictions of life, and there are many common threads between vignettes, such as the Tesla coil, medical knowledge, the suggestion that coffee and cigarettes don't make for a healthy meal (generally lunch), cousins, The Lees (Cinqué and Joie, and a mention of Spike Lee), delirium, miscommunication, musicians, the similarities between musicianship and medical skill, industrial music, acknowledged fame, and the idea of drinking coffee before sleeping in order to have fast dreams. In each of the segments of the film, the common motif of alternating black and white tiles can be seen in some fashion. The visual use of black and white relates to the theme of interpersonal contrasts, as each vignette features two people who disagree completely yet manage to sit amicably at the same table.
The eleven segments that make up the film are as follows:
This is the original 1986 short Coffee and Cigarettes with Roberto Benigni and Steven Wright having a conversation about coffee and cigarettes.
Originally the 1989 short Coffee and Cigarettes, Memphis Version – aka Coffee and Cigarettes II – this segment features Joie Lee and Cinqué Lee as the titular twins and Steve Buscemi as the waiter who expounds on his theory on Elvis Presley's evil twin. Cinqué Lee also appears in "Jack Shows Meg his Tesla Coil". The scene also features a recounting of the urban legend that Elvis Presley made racist comments about Blacks during a magazine interview.
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