Written and directed by the ever-unpredictable
Jim Jarmusch, Mystery Train is comprised of three short anecdotes involving foreign tourists in Tennessee. Each story is set in a fleabag Memphis hotel which has been redressed as a "tribute" to
Elvis Presley. Story #1 involves two Japanese tourists whose devotion to Elvis blinds them of everything around them. Story #2 finds eternal victim
Nicoletta Braschi sharing a room with stone-broke
Elizabeth Bracco and having her problems solved by a spectral vision of The King. And story #3 offers the further misadventures of Bracco, her no-good boyfriend and her dysfunctional family. Any film that features Screamin' Jay Hawkins as a hotel clerk has us squarely in its pocket. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide