Bagdad Café

A overweight German tourist is dumped in the middle of nowhere by her angry husband and puts in motion a set of unlikely comic and touching events.

Here in the Internet age we can do a lot of good work digging up and re-appraising films that deserve to be seen. While this is film might not to be everyone's taste it is a wonderful light drama about people of no particular importance doing very little beyond learning about each other.

Yet it works so well and haunts you for days after seeing it.

For reasons I also can't explain I find the American hinterlands strangely poetic and underused. Films such as Paris, Texas and The Last Picture Show also used these regions effectively.

More than any other film I have seen it cannot really be explained in words. It is about atmosphere and delivery and superb acting for a cast of - mostly - unknowns. It doesn't really have a plot as such and merely lingers in small-town America and observes small town mores and manners with cold detachment.

A little gem.