I am torn: We could call it intensity and apathy. Or we could call it intense apathy… Or apathetic intensity… Take your pick, this movie has got plenty of it.
Jim Jarmusch’s film Down by Law centers on two different New Orleans low-lifes (Zack and Jack) who are both duped (by different folks and in different ways) into taking the fall for a crime they did not commit. Zack and Jack end up in the same cell together, and the rest of the film focuses on their time in prison (with an Italian named Roberto for comic relief) and their unlikely escape.
Although there is little action in the film, the movie maintains an intense feeling (all black and white, grimy sets, long quiet shots, and sparse background music) while Zack and Jack respond to everything that happens to them with an overwhelming sense of apathy.
After the opening title sequence (which briefly introduces our two leading men), there is a scene in which Zack’s girlfriend is outrageously throwing his personal belongings around. She smashes his records, claiming that she “is completely finished with (Zack).” She asks him why he “can’t stay at one (radio) station a while,” which informs the viewer that he is more than likely an out of work DJ. However, throughout Zack’s girlfriend’s rant, Zack remains docile in a sitting position, seemingly just casually waiting for this rant to be over. He certainly shows no signs of wanting to save his current relationship. In fact, the only point at which Zack rises from his position is to stop his girlfriend from throwing his shoes out the door: “Not the shoes. Not the shoes,” he says. So Zack does care about something, and it turns out to be his shoes: a practical man, perhaps. His girlfriend struggles with him for possession of the shoes, yelling, “Come on hit me motherfucker!” She seems to just want Zack to show some kind of passion, and since he has no passion to work and no passion for her, maybe she can get him angry enough to show some sign of emotion. However, she fails, and Zack calmly tells her: “I guess it’s over between us, alright?” So his girlfriend’s intensity is met by Zack’s total apathy.
This same apathetic response shows up in the next scene, but this time it is Jack who seems to have no worries or cares. This scene shows Jack, the pimp, counting a small stack of cash while a nude prostitute, Bobbie, maintains a one-way conversation with him. Like Zack, Jack is apathetic and detached from the dirty world around him. Bobbie tells him that he “doesn’t understand any kind of people,” and that he “sure doesn’t understand women at all, and a pimp is supposed to at least understand women.” She tells Jack that “if [he] was a good pimp he would’ve hit her by now, or done something.” So like Zack’s girlfriend, Bobbie is unable to elicit any emotional response from him. In fact, it is clear that Jack has not paid any attention to Bobbie’s speech, but only responds by stating, “You sure can talk, can’t you baby?” At one point in the scene when Jack is prepping himself in the mirror, Bobbie even holds up a loaded gun at Jack’s back (which the viewer can assume he sees based on the position of the mirror in the background), which also results in no response from Jack. Bobbie just flops her arm back on the bed, still holding the gun, but gives up on getting any rise out of Jack.
So the film’s introduction to the two main characters shows them much in same light: unresponsive, detached, and apathetic to the serious and dirty world around them.
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