Film

Down by Law

Name: Down by Law
Genre: Crime, Drama, Comedy
Released: 1986
Cast: Tom Waits, John Lurie, Roberto Benigni, Nicoletta Braschi, Ellen Barkin

Jim Jarmusch's black-and-white fable strands a disgraced DJ, a small-time pimp and a wildly cheerful Italian tourist in a New Orleans jail cell, then lets them wander the swamp once they break out. It's less concerned with plot than with rhythm — long silences, Tom Waits's growl, Roberto Benigni's manic charm. A hangout movie wearing a prison picture's clothes, made for people who like mood over momentum.

TMDb rating

7.4

If you liked this

Stranger Than Paradise1984

This is where Jarmusch invented the mood Down by Law perfects — deadpan drifters, long static shots, jokes that land three seconds late. If you loved the rhythm more than the plot, this is the purest dose.

But Even slower and stranger, with almost nothing resembling a plot at all — some find it inert rather than hypnotic.

Mystery Train1989

Jarmusch splits Memphis into three overlapping nightlong stories, all sharing one hotel and the same hushed, elegant humour. It's the closest thing to a sequel in spirit — strangers, coincidence, low light, big feeling.

But Anthology structure means less time with any one character than Down by Law gave you.

Night on Earth1991

Five taxi rides across five cities, each a tiny two-hander bristling with Jarmusch's love of odd company forced together. Winona Ryder and Gena Rowlands' segment alone is worth the ticket.

But Uneven — some cab rides land far harder than others, and the format fragments the mood.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Boudu Saved from Drowning1932no page yet

Jean Renoir's tramp — rescued, ungrateful, uncontainable — is the ancestor of Roberto's manic, rule-breaking joy. Down by Law's idea that freedom looks like chaos and bad manners starts here, fifty years earlier.

A vagrant is fished out of the river by a kindly bookseller and repays him by wrecking his household — a gleeful, anarchic comedy about how uncivilised freedom actually looks up close.

But Nearly a century old, in French, with a moral shrug some modern viewers find bracing and others find bratty.

Dead Man Walking1995

Jarmusch again, black and white again, but this time it's a hallucinatory Western with Johnny Depp as an accountant lost in the wilderness. Same unhurried dread, same gallows humour, rawer violence.

But Bleaker and stranger than Down by Law, with a body count the earlier film never touches.

O Brother, Where Art Thou?2000

The Coens take the escaped-convicts-wandering-the-South premise and turn it into a bluegrass odyssey — funnier and more fantastical, but with the same trio-of-misfits engine and swampy, sun-bleached charm.

But Broader and goofier throughout — the deadpan restraint that defines Jarmusch is nowhere in sight here.

Cool Hand Luke1967

The prison movie Down by Law is quietly answering — Paul Newman's grin against the machine, chain gangs, heat, and a stubborn refusal to be broken. The genre's granite foundation.

But Straighter, more heroic, and a good deal more sincere than Jarmusch's shrugging take on the same setup.

The Straight Story1999

David Lynch's gentlest film follows an old man driving a lawnmower across states to see his brother — the same patient, deadpan tenderness for oddballs, just with a G-rating.

But No crime, no jail, none of the outlaw energy — a much quieter, sweeter film.

Paris, Texas1984

Wim Wenders' road movie shares Robby Müller's eye — the cinematographer shot both films — and the same ache of drifting men who talk around what they actually feel.

But Far more melancholy and emotionally direct — it wants you to cry, not chuckle along.

Barton Fink1991

The Coens' fever dream of a writer trapped in a hotel room shares Jarmusch's love of claustrophobic company and strange, unhurried menace, with a jet-black sense of humour underneath.

But Weirder and more paranoid than Down by Law — less hangout movie, more slow-building fever dream.

Stir Crazy1980no page yet

Same setup — two mismatched guys land in jail and break out — played as loud, slapstick studio comedy instead of cool minimalism. Proof the shape works broad as well as deadpan.

Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor get framed, jailed, and turned into rodeo-riding outlaws in one of the great buddy comedies — the same bare-bones shape as Down by Law wearing a clown nose.

But Broad, dated, occasionally corny — the opposite of Jarmusch's cool in almost every frame.

The Farm: Angola, USA1998

Down by Law's jail is a stylised, almost jokey space you're glad to leave. This documentary, shot inside a real Louisiana penitentiary, shows what the joke is actually covering for — same setting, none of the cool.

An unflinching documentary following inmates at Louisiana's Angola prison as they face parole boards, execution dates and decades inside, made with extraordinary access. The sober, real-world floor beneath Jarmusch's stylised cell.

But Genuinely heavy and sad in ways Down by Law, for all its bars and bad luck, never once risks being.