A Serious Man
default -- Wed, 10/21/2009 - 16:09
JV, we've had some interesting discussions in the past about the Coen Brother's work. Have you seen their latest, A Serious Man? It's not going to be one of their big popular films, like No Country For Old Men, or Fargo, and I think some people will be disappointed in it. This one is once again a reminder that the Coen Bros. are masters of the shaggy dog story.
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BTW, JV, I wasn't logged in when I posted the above so the post wasn't signed.
Larry,
I haven't seen A Serious Man yet, because it hasn't opened in this backwater yet. However, I'm eager to. You know, I'm a huge fan of the Coens in spite of No Country. They've made several of my favorite films and one of the truly great films of the last twenty or thirty years (The Big You-Know-Who).
Just out of curiosity, did you see Zombieland?
Jon
JV,
I too have been a fan of the Coens for a long time, going back to Blood Simple.
No, I haven't seen Zombieland yet, and my wife is in it. Agree with you about The Big You-Know-Who.
There was a small Canadian film I saw recently on Showtime that I really enjoyed. It's called The Deal, with William H. Macy and Meg Ryan. Have you seen it?
Larry,
Your wife is in it? Zombie or still-with-us? It's a cute movie, modestly funny and peculiarly sweet, kind of like a Zombie-for-laughs version of The Road.
I haven't seen The Deal, but I'll look for it. I still haven't gotten over Macy not winning the Oscar for Fargo (and I'll bet he hasn't, either).
JV
William H. Macy is one of the most underrated actors working today. One of the things that the Coens always bring to their work is the ability to cast the right actors in the right roll. The look and "feel" of their characters is natural, and grows out a a keen observation of time and place.
My wife is in the Hollywood Blvd. scenes, one of the still-with-us. She won't do prosthetics anymore, after being a Cone Head and a member of the Klingon High Council.
LL
<< My wife is in the Hollywood Blvd. scenes, one of the still-with-us. She won't do prosthetics anymore, after being a Cone Head and a member of the Klingon High Council.>>
Far out!
I agree with you about Macy.
Jon
Well, I did see A Serious Man--at long last. And...I don't know. Like No Country (and many of the Coen's other films), it is a blatant allegory; like Barton Fink, the film it most resembles (though it is not nearly as funny nor as memorable nor as cruelly satsifying), it is very black comedy. For me, it is also a bit discomfiting in its depiction of a certain class of American Jewish intellectuals of the mid-60s. While I couldn't call it, as some have, anti-semitic, the film did make me squirm at its stereotyping, even as I laughed at the undeniable (but superficial) realism of those stereotypes. As everybody already knows, ASM is the Coen's parodic take on the single greatest book of the Old Testament--the Book of Job.
Like Job, Larry Gopnik is inexplicably beset by a plague of awful events; like Job, he is given explanation/consolation by three men (in the movie, three hilarious rabbis--only one of whom has the good sense to keep quiet when it comes to the mysteries of God's will). Unlike Job, however, Larry's good fortune is not restored after his terrible trials. Quite typically, the Coens pull the rug out from under him (and his family), just when he thinks it may be safe to go back in the water.
God never speaks directly to Larry in A Serious Man as he does to Job, but the Coens do--and what they have to say is, in keeping with the icy nihilism of most of their movies, bleaker and more relentlessly cruel than God's own imperial admonitions. Here there is no explanation for what befalls us and those whom we love (or despise)--at least none that I could suss. God isn't merely uninterrogatable; he isn't there.Bad things happen for no reason and that's about it. How we deal with them--or don't--is all that is within our power. Intellect doesn't matter; feelings (even fond and decent ones) gain us nothing; in fact, they're both silly. Acting with decisiveness is the most we can accomplish in the face of evil (as the Polish wife does in the amusing prologue). This moral isn't satisfying, and it isn't reassuring, either. Of course, neither is Job. But the Coens manage to cheapen it, because, at bottom, they aren't serious men. They are smart-alecks who have managed to turn one of the most profound book ever written into a parodic Coen Bros. movie.