B3 and I saw this lovely 1ittle 1987 film (called “Out of Rosenheim” in the somewhat longer German release) with Marianne Sachebrecht (Jasmine) and CCH Pounder (Brenda) when it first came out and it holds up very well. We wanted our daughter to see it, and our neighbor, Ron Pounder, loaned us the DVD. Two tourists, Jasmine and her husband, have a horrible fight in the desert as they tour around the barren Southwest. She walks off and he drives off. She arrives at the Café run by Brenda. The Café is a totally decrepit, filthy hotel/gas station peopled by Brenda, her incompetent husband, her valley girl daughter, her pianist son who’s in love with Bach, the Indian counter man, a wacked-out and wonderful painter (Jack Palance) who falls in love with Jasmine as both muse and woman, and a Thomas Mann-reading tattoo artist who eventually leaves because there’s “too much harmony”. Jasmine brings magic and love into the place with hard work, cleanliness, order, and playfulness as she learns magic from a kit and cleans the place up. It is a funny, loving, and very playful fairy tale of a film. In contrast to the “Magic Negro” of so many American films, this has a “Magic German” and it works. Palance is wonderful, Pounder shines, and Sagebrecht is a joy. Hell, it even shows Americans learning how to make a decent cup of coffee!. Some have suggested the ending (a musical number) is forced. I didn’t think so at all. Instead, it felt like they were becoming their own playful version of Vegas that all can enjoy. All of a sudden the Café is the coolest place in a very hot desert. Some very interesting lighting and filter use creates an intense ‘hot’ film