Book Reviews 211

Fishing with John. Written and Directed by John Lurie. With Jim Jarmusch, Tom Waits, Matt Dillon, Willem Dafoe, and Dennis Hopper. Video Release, 2004. The Criterion Collection. 185 minutes. No rating. Real Anglers will hate John Lurie, and that will make life more pleasurable for the rest of us. Lurie, founder and leader of The Lounge Lizards, a New York-based, Albert Alyer-inspired jazz group, does not know much about fishing. He enjoys going fishing, escaping the city, and talking with his friends. Lurie has unique pals: Jim Jarmusch, Tom Waits, Matt Dillon, Willem Dafoe, and Dennis Hopper. Fishing with John, a postmodern response to ESPN's fishing shows, is a trip into hipster's paradise, rich with ironic asides, cultural references, and absurdist nonsense. Even if you do not know the difference between a dry fly and live bait, Lurie's crackpot fishing forays are hilariously appealing. Like Izaak Walton, the angler's Messiah, Lurie has produced an unreliable fishing manual, a travelogue that is not really about how to fish but how to be, particularly if you have access to Japanese film money and a bent sense of humor. Lurie tracks fish from frozen Maine to steamy Thailand. All his companions embrace the idea of fishing, but reality sets in: Hopper turns paranoid, Waits becomes sea sick, Dillon loses focus, Jarmusch wonders what he is doing, and Dafoe and Lurie die from starvation. Robb Webb, who narrates commercials for the NFL and Hillary Clinton, lends his convincing voice to Lurie's fishing fantasies. Webb's voice-over can make us believe 212 Aethlon XXII:1 / Fall 2004 anything, even utter nonsense. He tells us that Lurie and Dafoe die as a result of their ice-fishing failures. By the next installment—tracking the giant squid with a hypoglycemic Hopper—Webb corrects himself: "I made a mistake. John is still alive." Lurie's cinematographers capture the natural beauty of every location, and the music, performed by Lurie, punctuates each setting. Lurie has starred in two Jarmusch films, Stranger than Paradise and Down by Law, and he has absorbed Jarmusch's laconic, deadpan filmmaking style. Six episodes make up the Fishing with John catalogue, and each reflects a homemade quality to it, if your home videos were made by professionals. Lurie and his Wayfarers mock Izzak Walton's classic The Compleat Angler, especially the Dafoe episode, which covers four full days, ending with a hallucinatory meal and apocryphal deaths. On his fourth day, Walton shares a recipe for pike served in a claret, anchovy, and butter sauce. Dafoe simply pours tequila over a white fish too large for the skillet. In reality, however, Lurie and his guest have caught nothing, and their sup- ply of cheese crackers has evaporated. It's doubtful these misfits will find Waltonian salvation. With his white pompadour and black clothes, Jim Jarmusch looks more like an escapee from a Win Winders' film than an angler. But he and Lurie drive to Montauk, New York, charged with adolescent glee, anticipating a success in their pursuit of shark. The trip becomes a demented parody of Jaws and "America's Funniest Home Videos," forwhen a real shark breaks the water, Jarmusch seems genuinely shocked by the creature. An original, eccentric collection of short films, Fishing with John can be as perplexing and as rewarding as a trout stream. Jack Ryan