Father Mother Sister Brother

For years, Jim Jarmusch has written, directed, and produced delicate, character-driven films, including Stranger Than Paradise (NYFF22), Down by Law (NYFF24 Opening Night), Only Lovers Left Alive (NYFF51), and Paterson (NYFF54). Winner of the Venice Film Festival Golden Lion, Father Mother Sister Brother is a perceptive study in familial dynamics, a feature film carefully constructed in the form of a triptych. The three chapters all concern the relationships between adult children reconnecting or coming to terms with aging or lost parents, which take place in the present, and each in a different country. Siblings Jeff and Emily (Adam Driver and Mayim Bialik) check up on their hermetic father (Tom Waits) in rural New Jersey; sisters Lilith and Timothea (Vicky Krieps and Cate Blanchett) reunite with their guarded novelist mother (Charlotte Rampling) in Dublin; and twins Skye and Billy (Indya Moore and Luka Sabbat) return to their Paris apartment to address a family tragedy. Father Mother Sister Brother is a kind of anti-action film, its subtle and quiet style carefully constructed to allow small details to accumulate—almost like flowers being carefully placed in three delicate arrangements. As always, Jarmusch brings his worlds to life with the essential assistance of his collaborators, including two masterful cinematographers, Frederick Elmes and Yorick Le Saux, and the brilliant editor Affonso Gonçalves. NYFF63 Centerpiece selection. A MUBI release.