The theme song of Jim Jarmusch’s Stranger Than Paradise is Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ recording of ‘I Put a Spell on You’. Perhaps it is the power of suggestion, but that is exactly what this fragile, diffident film seems to have done to its audiences. What other explanation could there be for the way it instantly transformed the image of the American independent filmmaking from idealistic but artistically naive to subversive and ultrahip? Made on a miniscule budget and with grainy black-and-white film stock left over from a Wim Wenders film, Stranger Than Paradise is rooted in the less-is-more aesthetic that defined punk rock (Jarmusch was a keyboardist of the post-punk group, The Del-Byzanteens) and New York’s underground film and theater scene in the 70s and early 80s.
The governing consciousness of the film is Willie, a permanently depressed, two-bit gambler, who spends most of his time hanging out in his tiny, sparsely furnished apartment, either on his own or with his sad-sack friend Eddie. Out of the blue, Willie’s teenage cousin Eva arrives from Hungary to visit for a few days before going on to Cleveland to live with their aunt. Eva’s presence stirs some faint memory of familial warmth in Willie and, for a few seconds after she leaves, he feels his loneliness more acutely. A year later, Willie and Eddie make some fast money cheating at poker and, to be safe, they decide to get out of town for a while. They drive to Cleveland to visit Eva, more out of default than desire – she is the only person they know.
A film that is figuratively and literally about missed connections, Stranger Than Paradise closes with Willie, Eddie, and Eva headed, by accident, in separate directions. For someone as shut down as Willie, there is no more apt fate than an open ending.