Useless Man is my favourite work from auteur Jim Jarmusch—a “psychedelic western” (as Jarmusch himself referred to as it) that follows William Blake (no, not that William Blake—this one’s an accountant, performed by Johnny Depp). Duped into touring to the rugged frontier of 1800s America, Blake endures a sequence of more and more unusual and horrifying calamities.
Fantastically shot in Jarmusch’s signature black-and-white model, the movie boasts an all-star solid of eccentrics: Depp, Billy Bob Thornton, Crispin Glover, John Damage, Robert Mitchum, Iggy Pop, Lance Henriksen, Gabriel Byrne, Alfred Molina, and extra. Including to its singular ambiance is Neil Younger’s unsettling improvised rating, which underscores the movie’s poetic contradictions—lyrical but crude, haunting but darkly humorous.
Useless Man seems like a film that holds infinite layers inside it, daring you to uncover its mysteries whereas reminding you that you just in all probability by no means will
