Paterson
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Storyline
The whole story, ending included.
A bus driver who writes poems and the wife who paints everything black and white; a week of a marriage that works.
Paterson drives a city bus in Paterson, New Jersey, the town whose name he shares. The film follows one week of his life, from a Monday to the next. He wakes a little after six beside his wife, Laura, eats his cereal and walks to the depot. Before his shift, and at lunch by the Great Falls of the Passaic River, he writes poems in a notebook he carries everywhere: about a box of matches, about Laura. On the bus he listens to his passengers. In the evening he walks their English bulldog, Marvin, and stops for one beer at Shades Bar, run by Doc.
Laura fills the house with black-and-white patterns and has a new plan every day. She orders a guitar and dreams of being a country singer; she bakes cupcakes to sell at the weekend market. She loves his poems, which no one else has read, and keeps urging him to make copies. He promises to do it at the weekend.
The week brings small events. Laura dreams that they will have twins. At the bar a regular, Everett, keeps pleading with Marie, who has left him, and on Friday night he threatens to take his own life; Paterson tackles him, and the threat turns out to have been made with a toy. That same day his bus breaks down with an electrical fault. On another afternoon a girl waiting on a street corner reads him a poem from her own secret notebook. On Saturday Laura's cupcakes sell well, and they celebrate with dinner and an old film. When they come home, Marvin has torn to pieces the notebook Paterson left on the sofa. The poems are gone.
On Sunday he walks to the falls and sits on his bench. A Japanese man sits down beside him, reading William Carlos Williams's Paterson, and talks about poetry. Paterson says he is not a poet. The man gives him a present, an empty notebook, and tells him that an empty page can hold more possibilities. Paterson writes a new poem in it. On Monday the week begins again.
Starring
Adam Driveras Paterson
A bus driver in Paterson, New Jersey, who writes poems in a secret notebook and shows them to no one but his wife.
Paterson’s story
Each day Paterson wakes after six, kisses Laura and walks to the depot; he drives his route, eats lunch by the falls, walks Marvin and drinks one beer at Doc's. Before work and at lunch he writes poems, about a box of matches, about Laura. He listens to his passengers and to a girl who reads him her poem, and meets each of Laura's new plans without mockery. He promises to copy his poems at the weekend. On Friday his bus breaks down, and at the bar he tackles Everett, whose gun turns out to be a toy. On Saturday night he finds the notebook torn to pieces by Marvin. On Sunday, at the falls, he tells a Japanese visitor that he is not a poet, accepts his gift of an empty notebook and writes a new poem in it.
Golshifteh Farahanias Laura
Paterson's wife, who decorates their home in black and white and dreams of cupcakes and country music.
Laura’s story
Laura wakes each morning with a new plan. On Monday she has dreamt that they will have twins, then she wants to be a country singer and orders a guitar, and she bakes cupcakes to sell at the weekend market. She paints the curtains and the walls in black-and-white patterns and makes her own clothes, and serves Paterson a pie that is not quite to his taste. She loves his poems, which no one else has read, and keeps urging him to copy them; he promises to do it at the weekend. On Saturday her cupcakes sell well, and they go out to celebrate with dinner and an old horror film. They come home to find that Marvin has torn his notebook to pieces. Her week ends with her own venture a success and the poems she loved gone.
Barry Shabaka Henleyas Doc
The owner of Shades Bar, where Paterson stops for a single beer every night on his walk with Marvin.
William Jackson Harperas Everett
A regular at the bar, desperate to win back Marie, whose despair comes to a head on Friday night.
Masatoshi Nagaseas Japanese Poet
A visitor from Japan, reading William Carlos Williams by the falls, who gives Paterson an empty notebook.
Why it matters
Paterson makes room for two things: a marriage that works, and art made for no one. Very little happens in it. Jim Jarmusch sets a bus driver's routine beside his inner life and finds no quarrel between them; the route, the lunchbox and the evening beer are where the poems come from. The marriage rests on generous difference. Laura's plans change daily, and Paterson meets each with patience rather than mockery, even when he cannot share it. When the dog destroys the notebook, the loss is real and the film does not soften it; in place of consolation it offers a stranger's blank page. It competed for the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2016. The question it leaves is gentle and difficult at once: whether work that nobody reads still counts, and what it means to love someone without asking them to change.