Through the seventies, Tom Waits built a following around his grisly voice and drawling variations of jazz styles, but his potential was only beginning to be realized. He risked his fan base as his 80's releases began to take a dark, home spun blues approach. The albums of the period include 83's Swordfishtrombones, 85's Rain Dogs, and 87's Frank's Wild Years, all of which showcase a heavy croon to sailor chants and work songs, retooled as if being played by an old music box. The experimentation with improvised percussion and recording techniques, playing outside or through walls, whatever it took to make the noise needed is what separated Waits from his beat contemporaries, and keeps him as one of the most original performers still playing today. his strive for vision is apparent as he culminates three albums of work with a string of high-concept performances, monologues, and character asides.
Un Operachi Romantico
Waits plays nearly every role, beginning with the only real character, a man trying to sleep as the world outside celebrates the dawn of a new year. As he slowly drifts to sleep, he imagines a show where he is everyone from the star to the ticket taker. The characters and roof top monologues serve as a break up of the shifty stage performance, where Tom Waits the singer mugs the spotlight (or mine lantern) for everything it's worth.
His songs are primarily tragedies of the forgotten people of the world, the bowery bums of the slippery slums, and their prayers and problems. His band feels like a mish-mash of mediterranean street musicians, thumping strangling bass lines and ripping guitar solos that sound like French ambulances. These soul bearing players thankfully rob most of the attention to a film that, pound for pound, a roughly put together piece.
Waits' Film Unfolds as Improvisational Drama
Director Chris Blum, whose only other credit is the music video for Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start The Fire", does little to impede the improvisational cinema Waits is attempting. The mistakes allowed, such as repeated sections of songs and poor audio redubbing, while aesthetically interesting, do little but jar otherwise smooth performances and scenes.
The one segment that stands out as a superbly directed moment is during Waits' "Train Song" near the end of the film. Waits, as a box office attendant on a slow night, puts on a pair of headphones and drifts off within his own dream to a time when things were easier. As he lulls himself to a better place, the film culminates in a grand bathtub finale of barroom wail "Innocent When You Dream", capping a staggering career change, and peak, for edgy artist Waits. 3 out of 4.
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