Amazon.com

Jasmin (Marianne Sägebrecht), a German tourist, has just walked off from her husband at the side of the road in the middle of the Mojave Desert; Brenda (CCH Pounder) has just kicked her husband out of the roadside cafe-motel they operate. When Jasmin arrives at the cafe, the two begin developing a prickly but ultimately rewarding friendship. Many other movies have tried to duplicate Bagdad Cafe's mixture of loose storytelling, off-kilter metaphors, and rich emotions, but most often these imitators leave out the random chaos of life and the awkward pain of change that Bagdad Cafe captures with such a gentle touch. Bagdad Cafe earns both its quirkiness and its sentiment by keeping one foot firmly rooted in reality. Director Percy Adlon teamed with star Sägebrecht in two other similarly offbeat movies, Sugarbaby and Rosalie Goes Shopping; his more recent features without her haven't been as successful. Still, he continues to be noted for his odd but lively use of color filters and jagged editing. Bagdad Cafe also features the great Jack Palance (Shane, Requiem for a Heavyweight, City Slickers) playing an easy-going painter; the opportunity to be an ordinary person, rather than his usual wicked fiends, brings out a delightful mischief in Palance. Pounder, who usually gets small supporting parts, deserves another role like this to take advantage of her remarkable range. All in all, an eccentric and wonderful film. --Bret Fetzer ... Read more

Reviews (54)

DESERT RATS GET ACTUALIZED!
Filmed not too far from here in the town of Baghdad in the Mojave Desert, Percy Adlon's BAGHDAD CAFE has charmed just about everyone who has stumbled across this literally off-the-beaten track 1987 gem that's now available for the first time in a bare-bones widescreen DVD transfer.

The story is deceptively simple. Marianne Sägebrecht is a German tourist who leaves -- and is subsequently abandoned by -- her husband(?) in the California desert. In the middle of nowhere, she makes her way to the run-down, failing, Baghadad Cafe and Motel run by C.C.H. Pounder (ER's Dr. Hicks). The rotund Sägebrecht quickly becomes a part of the eccentric family under Pounders tough-talking rule. Not only that, her presence is the catalyst that transforms the forgotten roadside stop into a bustling business and a life-altering experience for all present. Jack Palance is extraordinary as an ex-Hollywood set designer and artist who sees Sägebrecht's true beauty and becomes obsessed about capturing it on canvas. What he sees Sägebrecht becomes and in the process impacts those she touches. This wonderful film is about loving and accepting and believing and discovering and being. The original music by Bob Telson includes the haunting "Calling You" sung by Javetta Steele. This is one for the digital library. Highest recommendation.

Can't expain the attraction ' just see it
I found Bagdad Cafe on DVD three days ago and have watched it twice since, each time with a big smile on my face. It's difficult to explain why this movie is so haunting; if you try to tell a friend "You've got to see this movie because...", you'd be stuck for a definable reason. It's a very gentle character study of two women, different as can be, who come to understand and even like each other. They are both frustrated with their current positions in life. Jasmin (Marianne Sagebrecht), the stranded German tourist, is willing to start repairing her life, even in this bleak desert setting. Brenda (CCH Pounder) has led such a hard-knocks life that she can't understand or accept anyone trying to help her. There's a wonderful supporting cast surrounding them, but the heart of this movie is the way the two women learn to be friends. You're either going to love this movie or be totally bewildered by what I (and other reviewers) see in it.

This movie was shot in Newberry Springs, near Barstow; the restaurant is still there (originally called Sidewinder Cafe, now renamed the Bagdad Cafe, of course). This is the favorite movie of one of my sister's friend who lives in Brazil. When this friend's daughter Paula visited recently, we stopped by the Bagdad Cafe on the way to Vegas; Paula's mom shed tears of delight when she saw pictures of her daugher making a pilgrimage to this high desert Mecca.

My favorite movie of all time
This movie is just perfect. It deserves all the oscars in the world. After watching this movie, you feel good about life....

Different Worlds Harmonize -- Quiet Gem of a Film
When a middle aged Bavarian Tourist lands in a remote, scarcely populated California desert town, she creates not only a stir with the locals, but eventually brightens the spirits of her host family as well as all the "regulars" who pass through the "Bagdad Cafe". What started out as a "big mistake" soon looks like divine providence.

"Miss Jasmin" (the German lady with a matching accent) and "Miss Brenda" (the rough-talking owner of a greasy-spoon restaurant who employs Jasmin and gives her a home) become close friends. An aging "showbusiness man" (brilliantly played by pre-City-Slickers Jack Palance) views Miss Jasmin as his "muse" and is inspired to paint her portrait. When word gets out that her tourist visa had expired, the local Sheriff forces Jasmin to return to Germany. Sadness canvases the place where Jasmin had been embraced as a welcome change of schedule. The life she had brought with her seemed drained away with her departure.

There isn't much plot to stretch the running time (the original German cut runs nearly 2 hours), however there are many bittersweet moments in this simple, but beautiful film. The last few scenes deliver the inevidible (thus predictable) conclusion. A little on the "artsy" side and clearly without a multi-million dollar budget, but still a palatable final product.****

Yawn.
I'd heard nothing but good things about this movie from critics and family members. Clearly, a lot of folks like this movie. It didn't do a lot for me, though. It had its moments. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

"I can't believe my own mother wiped out my bank account."
"Rosalie Goes Shopping" is the story of just how far one woman can go on credit. In this satire on American consumerism, Rosalie, the German born matriarch of the Greenspace family, ensures that her large family gets only the very best in life. The Greenspaces have seven children and they all live together in a vast, sprawling ranch-style home in Arkansas. Dad, Ray--otherwise known as Liebling--flies his plane for a seed company. Rosalie 'handles' all the finances, and she's developed her money management style into a fine art. Between juggling bank accounts, bouncing checks, and plying her 37 credit cards, she manages to keep the family afloat and blissfully unaware of her creative financing methods.

The fine balance Rosalie maintains between solvency and debtor's prison almost comes to a grinding halt when her family's demands exceed even her ability to defraud local businesses and bankers, but then she gets her hands on a computer, and new horizons beckon.

Some of the most amusing scenes occur when one of the Greenspace boys brings home a guest for a family meal. One of the sons--whose ambition it is to be a chef--prepares gourmet multi-course extravagant meals nightly as 'practice.' The Greenspaces have their own unique language and customs, and to outsiders, the family is quite bizarre--preferring advertisements and the Home Shopping channel to television programmes. And it seems that they can repeat advertisements verbatim. Rosalie--in her van bearing the license plate "CHRG IT" pays frequent visits to the local priest (Judge Reinhold) to confess her sins regarding the financial fraud she practices every chance she gets. Rosalie is a fascinating character. She appears to be totally in control of the situation as she juggles bills--but in fact, of course, she's totally out of control and no one--with the possible exception of her sour daughter, Barbara--realizes exactly what she's up to. One star deducted for a disappointing ending. If you enjoy this film, I also recommend "Baghdad Cafe" and "Sugarbaby" by the same director, Percy Adlon, and starring the same marvelous German actress, Marianne Saegebrecht--displacedhuman

Top Notch Adlon
One of several films from the writer/director pair, Percy and Eleanor Adlon, featuring Marianne Sägebrecht. As with others (Sugarbaby and The Baghdad Café) we are presented with quirky story and innovative cinematography.

Rosalie (Sägebrecht), the matriarch of Greenspace family is presented with the daunting task of maintaining the lifestyle to which her family has grown accustomed embarks upon a series of zany plots to keep the bill collectors at bay. These include emptying her children's bank accounts, forging checks, juggling 37 credit cards and three mortgages all in an effort to keep every member of her enormous family happy. This is punctuated by routine visits to her local Catholic Priest (Judge Reinhold) where she confesses her trespasses. When her daughter demands a new PC for her birthday, she swipes her parent's airline tickets and buys it for her. She promptly becomes a pirate of the online banking world to keep above water.

This film is a hysterical satire of the American consumer society. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

A
Slow-moving but stunningly photographed and detailed account of the relationship between Marcel Proust (Arndt) and his devoted housekeeper (Mattes). Based on the real Celeste's memoirs. ... Read more

Reviews (24)

Sensuality Plus
After taping this film from TV, I just had to have it. I had never heard of k.d. lang before, but I was so impressed by her performance and her voice that I have become a k.d. devotee since then. The raw emotion combined with the purity of her voice are a combination that is not only hard to beat but IMPOSSIBLE to beat! The empathy and understanding of the emotions of the characters is unsurpassed and k.d. and Rosel excel in their roles. This is not just a movie for or about lesbians...This is a movie about people, Real People. This movie is so intensly emotional and so sensual that you had better be able to have your full attention on Salmonberries or you will miss sharing a wonderful experience.

Kots as a girl
Kots in gSalmonberriesh is definitely one of the most difficult characters to analyze in vast number of movies. She does not only have her gender confusion, she also struggles amongst her nationality, class, and roots. Obviously her gender problem is led by this lack of establishing her identity.
Unlikely most of the other movies show womenfs body as commodity, Kotsf naked body was just appears instead of trying to make her body objectified. This scene reveals the moviefs core of the subject, which is that this movie tries to overthrow our established theory of Hollywood type movie, nice and cozy. On the contrary to watching the naked body of women in most of the movies make male viewer pleasurable somehow, watching Kots naked does not give anybody comfortable feeling.
Plus, there is no stereotypical things happening in this movie. Strange things keep on happening and try to make us defamiliatize. To help this defamiliatization, the class, which Kots in does a good job. The way she lives just looks uncomfortable, cold, and full of confusion toward her identity.
The case of confusion, which Kots has is very rare, we can simply obverse what happens when the intersection of confusion of race and gender. Observing this intersection is sort of pitiful because most of the time we feel very uncomfortable watching a middle-aged woman and almost-boy looking girl kiss or trying to develop their relationship. However, this movie tries to make us have queer feeling, thus, in this point, this movie is successive.
Another important point of Kotsf disconnected identity is symbolized by Germany, which this country was two completely different countries, however they united together. To unite completely, they have lots of difficulties make everything organized, just like it is really difficult to organize Kotsf identity, and establish stable one. Thus, the collapse of Berlin walls, then trying put them together is paralleled with Kotsf journey of establishing her identity.

Not Worth The Watch Except To See KD Naked I guess
I don't consider this a lesbian film at all. There was little chemistry between the two characters. There were many confusing hallucinatory scenes which were simply added. The scenery was beautiful and KD's song (grossly overplayed over and over) is beautiful as well. But honestly, if that's all you can say is this had great scenery, a beautiful theme song and a good acting job by KD...that alone does not make a movie good. Although the acting was well done...the scenes seemed forced and the plot was scattered amongst many scenes trying to be artsy for arts sake.

Simply Awful
This is one of those movies that is so self-important that if you don't like it, you are made to feel as if you are intellectually incapable of "getting it." I say that this is a case where the Emperor is naked. This movie is contrived and uninteresting. And heaven forbid that you watch the bonus features... Honestly! You'd think that this movie was up to getting a Nobel Prize.

BAD BAD BAD
This has to be one of the worst Lesbian movies ever made!! Stay away, far far away...only for the k.d. Lang fans. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

SUGARBABY (ZUCKERBABY)
Marianne Sagebrecht, best known as the zaftig star of Bagdad Cafe and Rosalie Goes Shopping stars as a frumpy corpse-dresser who is very serious about her job...and about the good-looking subway-station caller she sees every day. She starts her own transformation of sorts and sets out to win him. Percy Adler directs this as well as the other two movies listed above. It's charming and surprising. In German with English subtitles.

SWEET AND LOW.....
It's an "Euridyce rescues Orpheus" story - Teutonic style.

Marianne Sagebrecht is stunning as the dumpy, overweight, mortician's assistant, drably commuting via subway, until she hears "that voice". Well, it happens to belong to the hunky young conductor casually announcing the various stops, and before you know it - she's tracking [stalking?] this guy, studying his eating habits, etc.......One evening on impulse,she buys him a candybar [his favourite] from an underground vending machine AND the rest is almost history.

Complications? Quite a few, but our heroine does her best and there is that transformation and THAT dinner preparation, with aftermath - funny and moving - shades of Billy Wilder's touch there.

There's also an odd twist to this original version.... slightly darker than the USA TV version. Almost a feel-good movie from Percy Adlon - who afterwards brought us "Bagdad Cafe" ["Out of Rosheim"] a real feel-good experience, also with Miss Sagebrecht -both worth watching! ... Read more

Amazon.com

Actress Marianne Sägebrecht reunites with her Sugarbaby director, Percy Adlon, in this story of a German woman abandoned by her husband in the Mojave desert and taken into a kooky community at a remote café. C.C.H. Pounder (Dr. Angela Hicks on television's ER) gives an atypically unhinged performance as the café owner, and Jack Palance is wonderful as an artist who wants to capture on canvas the beauty he perceives in the rotund Sägebrecht. Adlon's warm but slightly unreal colors give the film a hint of fantasy and time standing still for a life-changing adventure. --Tom Keogh ... Read more

Reviews (54)

DESERT RATS GET ACTUALIZED!
Filmed not too far from here in the town of Baghdad in the Mojave Desert, Percy Adlon's BAGHDAD CAFE has charmed just about everyone who has stumbled across this literally off-the-beaten track 1987 gem that's now available for the first time in a bare-bones widescreen DVD transfer.

The story is deceptively simple. Marianne Sägebrecht is a German tourist who leaves -- and is subsequently abandoned by -- her husband(?) in the California desert. In the middle of nowhere, she makes her way to the run-down, failing, Baghadad Cafe and Motel run by C.C.H. Pounder (ER's Dr. Hicks). The rotund Sägebrecht quickly becomes a part of the eccentric family under Pounders tough-talking rule. Not only that, her presence is the catalyst that transforms the forgotten roadside stop into a bustling business and a life-altering experience for all present. Jack Palance is extraordinary as an ex-Hollywood set designer and artist who sees Sägebrecht's true beauty and becomes obsessed about capturing it on canvas. What he sees Sägebrecht becomes and in the process impacts those she touches. This wonderful film is about loving and accepting and believing and discovering and being. The original music by Bob Telson includes the haunting "Calling You" sung by Javetta Steele. This is one for the digital library. Highest recommendation.

Can't expain the attraction ' just see it
I found Bagdad Cafe on DVD three days ago and have watched it twice since, each time with a big smile on my face. It's difficult to explain why this movie is so haunting; if you try to tell a friend "You've got to see this movie because...", you'd be stuck for a definable reason. It's a very gentle character study of two women, different as can be, who come to understand and even like each other. They are both frustrated with their current positions in life. Jasmin (Marianne Sagebrecht), the stranded German tourist, is willing to start repairing her life, even in this bleak desert setting. Brenda (CCH Pounder) has led such a hard-knocks life that she can't understand or accept anyone trying to help her. There's a wonderful supporting cast surrounding them, but the heart of this movie is the way the two women learn to be friends. You're either going to love this movie or be totally bewildered by what I (and other reviewers) see in it.

This movie was shot in Newberry Springs, near Barstow; the restaurant is still there (originally called Sidewinder Cafe, now renamed the Bagdad Cafe, of course). This is the favorite movie of one of my sister's friend who lives in Brazil. When this friend's daughter Paula visited recently, we stopped by the Bagdad Cafe on the way to Vegas; Paula's mom shed tears of delight when she saw pictures of her daugher making a pilgrimage to this high desert Mecca.

My favorite movie of all time
This movie is just perfect. It deserves all the oscars in the world. After watching this movie, you feel good about life....

Different Worlds Harmonize -- Quiet Gem of a Film
When a middle aged Bavarian Tourist lands in a remote, scarcely populated California desert town, she creates not only a stir with the locals, but eventually brightens the spirits of her host family as well as all the "regulars" who pass through the "Bagdad Cafe". What started out as a "big mistake" soon looks like divine providence.

"Miss Jasmin" (the German lady with a matching accent) and "Miss Brenda" (the rough-talking owner of a greasy-spoon restaurant who employs Jasmin and gives her a home) become close friends. An aging "showbusiness man" (brilliantly played by pre-City-Slickers Jack Palance) views Miss Jasmin as his "muse" and is inspired to paint her portrait. When word gets out that her tourist visa had expired, the local Sheriff forces Jasmin to return to Germany. Sadness canvases the place where Jasmin had been embraced as a welcome change of schedule. The life she had brought with her seemed drained away with her departure.

There isn't much plot to stretch the running time (the original German cut runs nearly 2 hours), however there are many bittersweet moments in this simple, but beautiful film. The last few scenes deliver the inevidible (thus predictable) conclusion. A little on the "artsy" side and clearly without a multi-million dollar budget, but still a palatable final product.****

Yawn.
I'd heard nothing but good things about this movie from critics and family members. Clearly, a lot of folks like this movie. It didn't do a lot for me, though. It had its moments. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Dull as dirt
"Younger and Younger" is a bizarre and irksome movie.
Jonathan Younger appears to be a successful businessman, but actually depends on his unappreciated wife, Penny, to do all the work. Jonathan manages to get around, and one day when Penny hears him having an affair, she dies on the office floor (sounds highly improbable to me). Jonathan is apathetic at first, but starts seeing the ghost of his wife everywhere he looks.
Meanwhile, Jonathan's son, Winston, comes home from Europe to help keep up the company. Winston is swamped by his new duties, and receives no help whatsoever from his daydreaming father.
Somewhere along the way, Winston gains a foreign girlfriend and Jonathan and Penny are finally united forever.
The plot is utterly ridiculous, and the director does not bother to explain several peculiar moments. This movie is ultimately boresome, and its only positive element is Brendan Fraser.

My brother-in-law was in this!
My brother-in-law was in this movie. He doesn't talk, but he's one of the ball room dancers. Near the end of the movie he spins a girl and she falls to the floor... don't know if that was on purpose, but they kept it in... probably for comic relief becuase this was such a boring movie. I only watched it becuase he was in it. Brenden Frasier is adorable in it, but he always is!! ... Read more

Reviews (2)

"I can't believe my own mother wiped out my bank account."
"Rosalie Goes Shopping" is the story of just how far one woman can go on credit. In this satire on American consumerism, Rosalie, the German born matriarch of the Greenspace family, ensures that her large family gets only the very best in life. The Greenspaces have seven children and they all live together in a vast, sprawling ranch-style home in Arkansas. Dad, Ray--otherwise known as Liebling--flies his plane for a seed company. Rosalie 'handles' all the finances, and she's developed her money management style into a fine art. Between juggling bank accounts, bouncing checks, and plying her 37 credit cards, she manages to keep the family afloat and blissfully unaware of her creative financing methods.

The fine balance Rosalie maintains between solvency and debtor's prison almost comes to a grinding halt when her family's demands exceed even her ability to defraud local businesses and bankers, but then she gets her hands on a computer, and new horizons beckon.

Some of the most amusing scenes occur when one of the Greenspace boys brings home a guest for a family meal. One of the sons--whose ambition it is to be a chef--prepares gourmet multi-course extravagant meals nightly as 'practice.' The Greenspaces have their own unique language and customs, and to outsiders, the family is quite bizarre--preferring advertisements and the Home Shopping channel to television programmes. And it seems that they can repeat advertisements verbatim. Rosalie--in her van bearing the license plate "CHRG IT" pays frequent visits to the local priest (Judge Reinhold) to confess her sins regarding the financial fraud she practices every chance she gets. Rosalie is a fascinating character. She appears to be totally in control of the situation as she juggles bills--but in fact, of course, she's totally out of control and no one--with the possible exception of her sour daughter, Barbara--realizes exactly what she's up to. One star deducted for a disappointing ending. If you enjoy this film, I also recommend "Baghdad Cafe" and "Sugarbaby" by the same director, Percy Adlon, and starring the same marvelous German actress, Marianne Saegebrecht--displacedhuman

Top Notch Adlon
One of several films from the writer/director pair, Percy and Eleanor Adlon, featuring Marianne Sägebrecht. As with others (Sugarbaby and The Baghdad Café) we are presented with quirky story and innovative cinematography.

Rosalie (Sägebrecht), the matriarch of Greenspace family is presented with the daunting task of maintaining the lifestyle to which her family has grown accustomed embarks upon a series of zany plots to keep the bill collectors at bay. These include emptying her children's bank accounts, forging checks, juggling 37 credit cards and three mortgages all in an effort to keep every member of her enormous family happy. This is punctuated by routine visits to her local Catholic Priest (Judge Reinhold) where she confesses her trespasses. When her daughter demands a new PC for her birthday, she swipes her parent's airline tickets and buys it for her. She promptly becomes a pirate of the online banking world to keep above water.

This film is a hysterical satire of the American consumer society. ... Read more