Paterson (2016 )
Directed by Jim Jarmusch, Paterson starts after 6:00 on a Monday morning. Between sleep, Laura (Golshifteh Farahani) tells Paterson (Adam Motorist), “I had a beautiful dream.” Instantly, I’m smitten. Laura discloses dream information– a sweet regimen of the baker, painter, and aiming country vocalist– about their “little” twins.
Rather poetically, repeating occurs throughout this town brimming with poets, from overheard spoken word by Approach Man in the laundromat to a bench shown a poet from Osaka, who “breathe [s] poetry.” Soon after discussing two dream children, Paterson areas twins in matching plaid coats while strolling to work as the first lines of “Love Poem” arrive. “We have plenty of matches in our house,” Paterson repeats.
Based in Paterson, New Jersey, Paterson is a “bus motorist that likes Emily Dickinson,” as a young poet, and twin, later observes. In this darling scene, Paterson happens upon the long-haired poet, in the middle of factories, toiling over a “secret notebook.” The perky writer shares “Water Falls,” which starts, “Water falls from the intense air.” The last line– “The majority of people call it rain.”– stuns me. So different from the prior language: puddles described as “unclean mirrors with clouds and buildings inside.”
For the 2016 film, Jarmusch composed “Water Falls,” and Ron Padgett, the titular poet’s work. Dot, Padgett’s forthcoming collection from Coffee House Press (November 2022), “demonstrates how any experience, no matter how mundane, can lead to a poem that flares like gentle fireworks.”