(1995) The generosity of human kindness flows and astonishing gifts are exchanged in director Wayne Wang and writer Paul Auster's fascinating film, with an interplay of comic and dramatic elements, accompanied by Rachel Portman's intimate score.

Sir Walter Raleigh, who introduced tobacco to England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, performed an experiment, weighing the smoke from a cigar, elucidates Paul Benjamin (William Hurt) inside the Brooklyn Cigar Company, a tobacco shop owned by Auggie Wren (Harvey Keitel), in the summer of 1990. After Paul departs with his usual smokes, Auggie explains to his other customers that Paul is a published novelist whose wife, pregnant at the time a few years back, was an innocent bystander shot dead during a robbery; since then Paul hasn't felt much like writing, having run out of luck rather than ideas.

Outside Paul, wandering distractedly, nearly walks in front of a truck when he's rescued by a black kid, who calls himself Rashid (Harold Perrineau Jr), whom Paul buys a lemonade in gratitude and gives his address for future reference.

Every morning at eight o'clock, Auggie takes a photograph of the same corner; he shows his collection of over 4,000 black-and-white snapshots ("a record of my little spot") to Paul, who tearfully recognizes his wife Ellen in one of the images.

Rashid shows up at Paul's cramped flat, stashes a paper bag in a bookcase, and departs after two nights (at Paul's insistence since resuming his working on a manuscript the writer needs his privacy); soon after a black woman barges in on Paul, demanding to know the whereabouts of Thomas. Aunt Em apprises Paul of her runaway nephew, Thomas Jefferson Cole, aka Rashid, who has been living with her and her husband in the projects since the boy's mother was killed in an automobile accident and his father disappeared a dozen years back.

Meanwhile, after locating the owner of a rundown garage, Cyrus Cole (Forest Whittaker), with a hook prosthetic for a left hand, Rashid, calling himself Paul Benjamin, gets hired temporarily to clean out trash; he delivers an old TV set as a gift to Paul. When asked about his missing hand, Cyrus explains, "What a bad, stupid, selfish man I am." He's remarried with a young child.

Unexpectedly after an 18-year absence, Auggie's ex-wife Ruby (Stockard Channing), wearing a black eye patch, introduces Auggie to the subject of "our daughter," Felicity (Ashley Judd), who left Pittsburgh for Brooklyn where she's shacked up with a guy, "strung out on crack and four-months pregnant."

When Rashid gives Paul the TV, he also tells Paul about his encounter with Charles Clem the Creeper, the reason, he says, for not wanting to return to his aunt and uncle's home. Paul shares with Rashid the story of a skier who finds his frozen father 25 years after an avalanche before the pair invite April Lee to join them to celebrate Rashid's 17th birthday.

As a favor to Paul, Auggie agrees to hire Rashid; stashed in the lavatory under the sink are the Cuban cigars in which Auggie has invested $5,000.

In need of a Christmas story for a magazine piece he's been commissioned to compose, Paul, having survived a beating, listens to Auggie's incredible account of the events following his picking up a shoplifter's wallet fourteen years earlier during which he obtained a camera.

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Copyright © 2008 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
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