Two films recently watched, with a few things in common.

The Station Agent. Quiet little US indie-flick. Music by queer indie muso (Mr Stephen “Hedwig And The Angry Inch” Trask), former Dawson’s Creek actor in cast (Ms Williams), Ms Patricia Clarkson (from Far From Heaven and Dogville) excelling in a main role. Like Mr H Macy and Mr Nighy, she must give hope to actors everywhere that, even in these youth-obsessed times, Movie Life can really begin at 40.

Here she’s a scatty, coffee-spilling artist who befriends Finn, a trainspotting loner. Finn inherits a disused railway shack, where’s he’s happy to be left alone by people. Entirely understandable, given the unkind reception he gets from strangers due to his restricted stature. Children shout “where’s Snow White?” as he passes them on the street, while a shopkeeper takes his photo without asking. I’m not convinced people would be THAT outwardly cruel in real life – and these moments are my only criticisms of an otherwise brilliant film.

The DVD box blurb cunningly evades using the word “dwarf”, leaving it to the sleeve photos to make Finn’s – or, rather, the actor Mr Dinklage’s – most distinguishing feature apparent. The Daily Mail would probably call this sort of thing Political Correctness, but it’s really DVD blurb as Good Manners.

I’m reminded of Thora Hird’s fading resident of an old people’s home in Mr Bennett’s “Waiting For The Telegram”.

“Then we start doing these exercises, naming folks. I’m quite good at that… Rene, Mary, Hilda. And then I get stuck. She says, “Describe, Violet. Say, the lady in the yellow frock.” I said, “The black lady.” She said, “No, Violet. It’s better to say the lady in the yellow frock.”

“I says to Francis, “It’s a complicated business, talking.”

The best character in the movie, though, is Joe: a gregarious Cuban hot dog salesman. He is an almost puppy-like boyish man who lights up the screen, his absence equally palpable in the scenes without him. Reminiscent of one of the more cheering characters in Dickens. Joe Gargery in Great Expectations springs to mind.

These three well-written characters mope around quietly in the leafy New Jersey wilds, along with Ms Dawsons Creek and a bored loafing schoolgirl, for 90 minutes. They become tentative friends, the tentative friendship is challenged, a lasting friendship is confirmed. It’s a tried and tested basic story, but with memorably original characters. And it’s so easy on the ears. Nothing explodes. No car chases. Actually, there is a train-chase. But it’s quite a quiet train-chase. A marvellous film.

Pieces Of April Another quiet little US indie flick. Though as with the other film, I use the word “little” purely in terms of budget and duration. Pieces Of April takes a mere eighty minutes of one’s attention.

Again the music is by a queer indie muso (Mr Stephin “Magnetic Fields” Merritt), again there’s a former Dawson’s Creek actor in the cast (Ms Holmes), and again Ms Clarkson is present and correct.

Here she’s an unkind mother riddled with breast cancer. Rather than improving her character, even making her saintly (as cancer films tend to do), her illness has rendered her even more unpleasant. When asked if she has one single nice memory about her estranged eldest daughter (Ms Holmes), she cites an incident that turns out to be her other daughter. She also takes delight in showing her mastectomy photos to her own Alzheimer’s-stricken mother. Not something one sees very often in the movies.

Ms Clarkson spends most of the film holding court in the back seat of the family car with her loving but long-suffering relatives, on the way to visit Ms Holmes in New York. Despite having to stop to vomit messily in a service station bathroom, one hand on the sink, the other guarding her chemotherapy wig, Ms Clarkson is very much the vehicle’s strongest spirit. She uses her cancer as a whip to order others around, or to belittle them with impunity. Terminal illness as an extreme form of passive aggression. Once again, not something too common in films.

Meanwhile we get to spy on the car’s destination: the minimum-rent NYC flat of eldest daughter Ms Holmes. She is preparing them a Thanksgiving meal. It will be a final attempt, the poor father hopes, to make one pleasant memory between mother and daughter, before mother dies. But as soon as her live-in boyfriend goes out, her oven breaks down, forcing her to seek aid from the mixed batch of residents in the other flats. This being the metropolis, her neighbours are complete strangers to her. This being a rather well-written film, they’re all characters that could get films of their own, even if their dialogue amounts to a few lines of turning Ms Holmes’s appeal down.

One such neighbour is a slightly strange, immaculately-dressed man played rather well by Jack from Will & Grace. Far less camp than Jack, far more… worrying. His only companion is a pampered pug dog constantly cradled under one arm. At one point he holds Ms Holmes’s uncooked turkey to hostage, as punishment for her lack of manners. She calls the police to report a kidnapping.

Needless to expatiate, Mr Jack’s character is the sort of part I’d love to play myself.

Despite the subject matter, Pieces of April is frequently genuinely funny and genuinely moving without resorting to crass sentimentality. Like The Station Agent, it’s the perfect film to watch if one is feeling pessimistic about The Soul Of Man, and indeed The Soul Of American Screenplays. Hats off to the makers of both films.