The Triangle

Issue date: 5/15/09 Section: Arts & Entertainment

Media Credit: Focus Features

A communal sigh of relief surfaces among critics once the credits roll for Jim Jarmusch's newest film, "The Limits of Control." The sighs don't come out of contentment, but of deep frustration. There is no mistaking that Jarmusch films are tailor made for a specific audience: the cognoscenti of emerging neighborhoods. What is exasperating is Jarmusch has neglected his audience in this most recent effort and possibly got lost along the way himself in this "journey film," which is less a film and more an exercise in futility.

The terrain isn't terribly unfamiliar to Jarmusch. The onset plays like a bad dirge from Jarmusch's 1999 film "Ghost Dog: The Way of The Samurai." A lone mystery hitman (Isaach De Bankolé) gets an assignment from two unidentified men seated in an airport terminal. Before they part ways, the two men impart a metaphysical reminder upon our unlikely protagonist: everything is subjective and reality is arbitrary. These are the rules of the game, and while these musings have a valid point, they do not make for an interesting film.

In this film, we follow the lone hitman into sunny Spain. By ritual, the hitman invariably orders a double espresso but "in separate cups." As a disciplined hitman, he requires ritual.

It's the idiosyncrasies, the deadpan quirks, that are signature in a Jarmusch film character. Jarmusch borrows heavily from a French new-wave film "Le Samoura'," directed by Jean-Pierre Melville. Jef Costello (Alain Delon), the hitman of the Melville film has his own ritualistic quirk - he swipes the brim of his fedora before he leaves his apartment. Jarmusch is a student of the long take and uses spare dialogue. Moving cinematography by Christopher Doyle offers visual delights, but isn't enough to redeem the film entirely. The soundtrack is well chosen (Boris, Sunn O), LCD Soundsystem, The Black Angels) and plays well over the lush cinematography.

The latter of the film is a series of encounters with oddball characters (Tilda Swinton, John Hurt, Gael García Bernal and Bill Murray). After some insouciant banter, there is an exchange of matchboxes branded Le Boxeur. Inside the matchbox is a coded message printed on paper that our protagonist habitually eats and washes down with espresso. In between episodes our taciturn protagonist meditates, practices tai-chi and occasionally visits an art gallery. Along the way, he finds a curvy woman (Paz de la Huerta) waiting for him in his hotel room, dressed only in thick frame glasses and a gun. To the temptation, the lone hitman replies, "Not while I'm working." In a different film with a traditional narrative, the nude woman would be one of a series of trials, or simply a love interest for the principal character. This is not that movie.

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