Skip to main content
Dead Man Movie Poster
Plot, Details & Awards

Dead Man

(1996)

Rated R for moments of strong violence, a graphic sex scene and some language.

R In Theaters 05/10/1996 , 121min.
Share this movie on

Plot & Details

A dark, bitter commentary on modern American life cloaked in the form of a surrealist western, Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man stars Johnny Depp as William Blake, a newly-orphaned accountant who leaves his home in Cleveland to accept a job in the frontier town of Machine. Upon his arrival, Blake is told by the factory owner Dickinson (Robert Mitchum) that the job has already been filled. Dejectedly, he enters a nearby tavern, ultimately spending the night with a former prostitute. A violent altercation with the woman's lover (Gabriel Byrne), also Dickinson's son, leaves Blake a murderer as well as mortally wounded, a bullet lodged dangerously close to his heart. He flees into the wilderness, where a Native American named Nobody (Gary Farmer) mistakes Blake for the English poet William Blake and determines that he will be Blake's guide in his protracted passage into the spirit world.
  • MPAA Rating: R
  • Genre(s): Action
  • Run Time: 121min.
  • Theatrical Release Date: 05/10/1996
  • DVD Release Date: 12/19/2000
  • Distributor(s): Electric Pictures
  • Director(s): Jim Jarmusch
  • Starring: Johnny Depp , Gary Farmer , Lance Henriksen , Michael Wincott , Robert Mitchum
  • Themes: Bounty Hunters,Fish Out of Water,Sheriffs and Outlaws,Taming the West,Unlikely Criminals,Flight of the Innocent
  • Tone: Enigmatic,Hallucinatory,Quirky,Melancholy,Bleak,Dreamlike
  • Keywords: Native-American,accounting,bounty-hunter,cowboy,cross-cultural-relations,cross-dressing,drugs,escape,factory-owner,gunfighter,journey,law,murder,mysticism,on-the-run,outlaw [Western],revenge,spiritual,surrealism
  • Language: English
Netflix - Try for Free

Instantly watch TV episodes and movies via the Internet on your computer or TV. 1 month FREE!

Stay Connected with Moviefone