A very mixed bag but fans of Jarmusch will enjoy it and it does have a certain curiosity value to cover the weaknesses

Rating: Null/10 (22 April 2005)

In hundreds of diners each day, people meet up for a chat, a cup of coffee and perhaps a cigarette. In this film we see a handful of such meetings involving all sorts  famous singers, cousins, twins, strangers or even just people by themselves. As in real life, the moods, aims and directions of each meeting are different and end different ways for the characters involved and, well, that's about as close to a "plot" summary as I can get! As a lover of short films I was looking forward to seeing this film because it seemed to be a collection of shorts made over quite a period, rather than being a collection of vignettes as in, say, Blue in the Face. However it quickly became evident that these segments would mostly not stand up on their own in the way a good short film would and they are much more just like sketches rather than shorts. Anyway, aside from the issue of definitions, this is still a very hit and miss affair with the majority being near-misses of half-hits, only a couple of them would I watch again on their own. Strange to Meet You is not that good; Twins is interesting and was a curiosity to me for having two of Spike Lee's siblings in it; Renee didn't do anything for me; No Problem was cool but pretty empty. However I did think that Somewhere in California was strong; Those Things Will Kill Ya was obvious but quite enjoyable; Cousins was interesting and engaging; Cousins? was sharp and enjoyable while Delirium was strangely comical although I probably enjoyed it more for the people than the content.
The cast do reasonably well within the material but I think some are better than others; as you might expect, I was more impressed with the acting in the shorts that I found most interesting  although I recognise that that is probably an unfair judgement of the performances. The direction is fairly static but also quite stylish and with a nice sense of place in each location; the black and white perhaps adds it more credibility but other than that I didn't see the reason other than maybe adding a consistency in colour that the material didn't provide.
Overall this is not as good as I had hoped but in fairness maybe I had my hopes unreasonably high. It does do what it claims to do by being a mixed collection of sketches; all of them are good enough to fill their short running times but not all of them are worth seeing. The weak ones and the good ones come pretty much 50/50 and you need to decide for yourself whether or not those odds make it worth your while. Fans of Jarmusch and "offbeat" films will likely enjoy it but I reckon the casual viewer may end up left a bit cold and unimpressed by it.