LaserDisc front cover
photo by Styrous®
One of my all-time favorite movies is Bagdad Cafe, a 1987 English-language German film directed by Percy Adlon (link below) a German director, screenwriter, and producer who is associated with the New German Cinema movement, whose "members" also include Werner Herzog and Rainer Werner Fassbinder.
detail photo by Styrous®
Bagdad Cafe is a comedy-drama set in a remote truck stop and motel in the Mojave Desert in California. A real cafe was used in the film, the Sidewinder Cafe, now – unsurprisingly renamed the Bagdad Cafe – on the famed old Route 66, between the east and west off-ramps of I-40, Newberry Springs, east of Barstow, on Highway 40 in the Mojave Desert, California.
The film is based on the Carson McCullers novella, The Ballad of the Sad Café (1951), and centers on two women who have recently separated from their husbands, and the friendship that that develops between them.
The casting for the film was brilliant (link below)! None of the actors, with one exception, were well-known, "established" American performers. That exception was Jack Palance as Rudi Cox, an ex-Hollywood set-painter, and he was sensational! Before this film I had always considered him an actor typecast as a rouge or swashbuckler of one kind or another. He was definitely not so in this case; his gentle, romantic side and his comedic talent glittered like diamonds!
Bagdad Cafe
The film is based on the Carson McCullers novella, The Ballad of the Sad Café (1951), and centers on two women who have recently separated from their husbands, and the friendship that that develops between them.
Marianne Sägebrecht, CCH Pounder ~ Bagdad Cafe
Photograph: Pelemele Film
The casting for the film was brilliant (link below)! None of the actors, with one exception, were well-known, "established" American performers. That exception was Jack Palance as Rudi Cox, an ex-Hollywood set-painter, and he was sensational! Before this film I had always considered him an actor typecast as a rouge or swashbuckler of one kind or another. He was definitely not so in this case; his gentle, romantic side and his comedic talent glittered like diamonds!
Bagdad Cafe ~ LaserDisc back cover detail
detail photo by Styrous®
Marianne Sägebrecht as Jasmin Münchgstettner, the abandoned German wife, was absolutely perfect in the role as was C. C. H. Pounder, who portrayed Brenda the owner of the cafe.
The customers of the cafe and the denizens inhabiting the motel attached to it were amazing and delightful (a tattoo aritst, etc.); there was one just surprise after another (link below).
The customers of the cafe and the denizens inhabiting the motel attached to it were amazing and delightful (a tattoo aritst, etc.); there was one just surprise after another (link below).
The score for the film was by Bob Telson and his song, Calling You, sung by Jevetta Steele, is one of the most unique tunes ever written for a film (link below). Telson also recorded an instrumental version; both versions are on the movie soundtrack. The song was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song at the 61st Academy Awards. Unfortunately, Let the River Run from Working Girl, with music and lyrics by Carly Simon, won the award.
Celine Dion covered Calling You during her live performances between 1990 and 1996. The 1994 performance by her recorded at the Olympia in Paris was included on the À l'Olympia live album and released as the first and only single in December, 1994, which peaked on the French Top 100 Singles Chart in the last week of 1994, reaching number seventy-five. It left the chart after five weeks (link below). The Olympia was the same venue where Édith Piaf achieved great acclaim giving several series of recitals from January 1955 until October 1962, and where she recorded her famous album, Piaf at the Olympia (link below).
George Michael of Wham! fame also did a cover of Calling You with a female singer singing the chorus during his 1991 "Cover to Cover tour" (link below).
During the film, Darron Flagg (Salomo, Brenda's son) brilliantly performs the preludes from Book I of the Bach The Well-Tempered Clavier: the C major, no. 1, BWV 845; the C minor, BWV 846, no. 2; and the D major, no. 5, BWV 850.
Bagdad Cafe was released on November 12, 1987, in Europe
and on April 22, 1988, in the United States. The film was successful at
the box office, with a US gross of $3.59 million.
Bagdad Cafe movie poster
In 1990, Bagdad Café was adapted as a TV series, with Whoopi Goldberg as the owner – a role she had refused for the film.
Viewfinder link:
Cast
The Guardian ~ How we made Bagdad Café Percy Adlon interview
Cinema 1544 ~ Bagdad Cafe
Roger Ebert ~ review
Eye for Film ~ review
Washington Post ~ review
The Guardian ~ How we made Bagdad Café Percy Adlon interview
Cinema 1544 ~ Bagdad Cafe
Roger Ebert ~ review
Eye for Film ~ review
Washington Post ~ review
YouTube links:
Carly Simon ~ Let The River Run
Bagdad Cafe Official Trailer
The Bagdad Cafe LaserDisc is for sale on eBay
Bagdad Cafe Official Trailer
The Bagdad Cafe LaserDisc is for sale on eBay
“The film is a kind of a fairytale . . .
I wanted it to look like a Salvador Dalí painting.”
~ Percy Adlon
I wanted it to look like a Salvador Dalí painting.”
~ Percy Adlon
Styrous® ~ Thursday, November 12, 2018
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