The Title is the Review

Film: Honey Don’t
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on Fire!

Someone needs to tell me what the hell happened to Ethan Coen. I consider myself a fan of the Coen Brothers. I’m not any kind of superfan—I haven’t seen their entire catalog, but I’ve seen more than I haven’t. When the Coens decided to separate artistically for a bit, Joel made The Tragedy of Macbeth, a film that earned three Oscar nominations. Ethan Coen made Drive-Away Dolls and then Honey Don’t, which are the two lowest-rated movies of his career. Like I said, I haven’t seen everything attached to Ethan Coen’s name, but I certainly understand why Honey Don’t sits under everything else of his I’ve seen, and in fact below pretty much everything he’s directed.

Honey Don’t was written by Coen with his wife, Tricia Cooke. It’s their second writing collaboration, and also the second in a proposed “lesbian B-movie trilogy.” Since neither of the two movies in the trilogy have been well-received, it does bring up the question of whether or not this will be completed.

Yippy Ki-Yay

Film: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
Format: Streaming vieo from NetFlix on the new internet machine.

Say what you will about the new “networks” putting together movies and shows, you can’t really say that they’re not going for it. Amazon, HBO, Hulu, and NetFlix are producing television and original movies that are as good or better than the more traditional networks and studios. That these studios are starting to see Oscar nominations is indicative of this, at least in some respects. A better indication is the level of talent working on these projects. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay, was written and directed by no less than the Coen brothers, and has a cast of extremely recognizable talent, even in miniscule roles.

What I didn’t realize when I start watching—I went into it completely cold—is that The Ballad of Buster Scruggs is an anthology. This is essentially six short films in one slightly-more-than-two-hour package linked together by someone flipping pages in a book and showing us a full-page illustration of the story to come. So, it was quite a shock to me when the first story ended and we move on to a completely new story.

Twice in One Week?

Film: Hail, Caesar!
Format: Market Square Cinemas.

I like the Coen Brothers’ movies. I’m not a complete fanboy—I haven’t seen everything they’ve done and I haven’t liked everything I’ve seen, but I’m always willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. My wife wanted to see Hail, Caesar! and last night both of the kids were out, so it seemed like a perfect opportunity to go. Aside from the annoying people behind us who decided to comment frequently during the movie, it was a good night out. The people behind us reminded me of why I don’t go to the theater that often, though despite having gone twice in the same week.

Hail, Caesar! takes place across slightly more than a day in the life of Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin), the head of production at Capitol Pictures during the later years of Hollywood’s Golden Age. Mannix is a man under a great deal of stress, which causes him to go to confession just about every day. However, what he’s confessing seems to be the sort of moral transgressions that could wait for a Sunday—lying to his wife about sneaking a cigarette or two, for instance. On this particular day, Eddie is dealing with some truly interesting problems.

Ten Days of Terror!: Blood Simple

Film: Blood Simple
Format: DVD from personal collection on laptop.

When the topic of directorial debuts comes up, it won’t go too long before I bring up Blood Simple, the first movie by Joel and Ethan Coen. I freely admit that I’m a Coen geek and so my opinion on this is going to be biased in some respect, but that doesn’t change the fact that Blood Simple would be a noteworthy film from an experienced director. As their first film, this is a strong showing, and they’ve only gotten better (mostly) from here.

Blood Simple has a twisted plot that goes in a lot of different places to get to the ending we eventually reach. Like any good noir, and Blood Simple is a vicious little noir, it starts simply and becomes much more complicated and convoluted as the story goes on. We begin with a simple extra-marital affair between Abby (Frances McDormand) and Ray (John Getz). Ray works as a bartender for Abby’s husband Marty (Dan Hedaya), who suspects that she’s being unfaithful. He’s hired a private detective named Loren Visser (M. Emmet Walsh) to catch them in the act, which he does easily.

Cat Fancy

Film: Inside Llewyn Davis
Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library on laptop.

I fully expected to love Inside Llewyn Davis. The fact that I didn’t, that I merely appreciate it and think it’s a well-made movie, makes me feel like something of a bad film geek. Mostly this is because virtually everyone I know who has seen it and every review I have read subsequent my viewing has raved about the film. I admit it’s a well-made film. I like the soundtrack a lot. It strikes me, though, as just another version of A Serious Man, which in my “I’ve seen 11 of the 16 Coen Brothers films” world ranks on the bottom. From what I know of it, I’m guessing that I might well have the same opinion of Barton Fink when I finally get around to it.

By this I mean that there is a strong streak of Kafka running through this film as well as with A Serious Man. There is very much the sense, a sense that the film go to great lengths to provide, that everyone knows what the score is and what is going on with the exception of our main character. There is a great deal of similarity between those main characters. Each is the type who, when told he is responsible for something, takes responsibility for it, whether he should or not. There is a feeling that the world makes sense to everyone but the character with whom we are to empathize. That character lives in a world that cannot be understood, in part because everyone else seems to understand it so well that they find no need to explain it. In truth, Brazil does the same thing.

A Serious Man

Format: DVD from DeKalb Public Library on laptop.

I like the Coen Brothers pretty much without exception. Note the words “pretty much” in that first sentence. Admittedly, I haven’t seen all of the Coen films, although I am in double digits with their filmography, and I’ve liked or loved all of them. Until now. There’s something about A Serious Man that simply rubs me the wrong way. I realize that I’m in the minority on this—there are a number of people who consider this one of their best if not their absolute best. For me, who has seen 10 of their 16 films, A Serious Man comes firmly in 10th place.

Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg) is a pretty ordinary guy on the surface, but a seething cauldron of angst underneath. His marriage is falling apart, his kids have no respect for him, his application for tenure is under review and not looking good, a student tries to bribe him, his brother sleeps on his couch, and his neighbor is constantly encroaching on his lawn. Everything starts to fall apart at exactly the same time.

Desperate Measures

Film: Fargo
Format: VHS from personal collection on big ol’ television.

In Fargo, Frances McDormand plays the seven month pregnant police chief of Brainerd, MN, Marge Gunderson. I say with absolutely no shame (and knowing that almost everyone who reads this will agree with me) that Marge Gunderson is one of my absolute, all-time favorite film characters. I could seriously watch her all day. There’s a part of me that’s sad that Margie only appeared in a single film, and a part of me that rejoices at this, since the character never got the opportunity to become stale and silly. No, Marge is great where she is, forever pregnant, forever looking like a rube on the surface, and forever being a damn fine police officer.

The marvelous thing about Fargo is that it excels in two of the most important aspects of any film. First, it has a great story. It’s complicated enough to be interesting, but simple enough to follow easily on a first watch. Things get complex in stages, and each stage makes a certain amount of sense. We don’t go into exhaustive and unnecessary details; we get what we need to follow along and make sense of the events that unfold. And since this is a movie that involves any number of shady deals, underhanded actions, betrayals and criminal acts, it’s naturally interesting.

Rebuilding the Old West

Film: True Grit
Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library on kick-ass portable DVD player.

It always strikes me as strange when directors I like do remakes, because the remake often strikes me as the lowest form of movie making. Oh, I know that’s not really true, but it does feel that way. It’s how I reacted when Scorsese remade Infernal Affairs as The Departed. So when the Coens remade True Grit, I was sort of nonplussed. And I was even more of that opinion when I remembered that this was the second time this had happened; the Coens remade The Ladykillers a few years ago.

Anyway, True Grit is a story of revenge. Mattie Ross (Hailee Steinfeld) sees her father killed and wishes the man brought to justice. Specifically, she wants to see the man hang. To see this come to pass, she hires Rueben “Rooster” Cogburn (Jeff Bridges), a marshal who seems to be the exact opposite of young Mattie in every respect. Mattie has a head for business and numbers, brooks no backtalk, and always attempts to deal from a position of strength. She isn’t shy about dropping the name of the family lawyer at every opportunity if she thinks it will get her what she wants, and she isn’t shy about making moral judgments on others. Cogburn, on the other hand, is a hard-drinking, vicious lawman who is really a lawman only in name. In truth, he’s little more than a talented gunslinger who sometimes shoots malefactors.

Cogburn attempts to go on the hunt without Mattie, but she has none of it. They are joined on the trail by LaBouef (Matt Damon) a proud Texas Ranger who is coincidentally searching for the same man, albeit under a different name. It seems that the man who shot Mattie’s pappy is a wanted man in Texas because he also managed to shoot and kill a senator. The trio rides together and splits up multiple times over the course of the movie, generally with LaBouef (pronounced as “lu-BEEF” throughout; my friends of the same last name in spelling say it differently) riding one way and Mattie and Cogburn riding another.

Finally, there is the confrontation, which is a big one. Mattie finally catches up with Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin), who is now riding with notorious outlaw Lucky Ned Pepper (Barry Pepper, who was possibly cast for the awesome reason that his last name is the same as that of the character), who also happens to be wanted. This means a bigger bounty for Cogburn, who seems to want little more than just enough money for his next meal. He doesn’t worry about whiskey—as a marshal, he just confiscates what he wants to drink.

And really, that’s it. True Grit is a pretty straightforward tale of a young girl looking for revenge for her father, and finding it in some unexpected places. The title, I think, refers not to Cogburn, although he certainly proves his mettle in the course of the film. Similarly, it could but does not refer to LaBouef. Mattie is the one with real grit here, and she demonstrates this at every possible turn.

For me, one of the real joys of the Coen brothers is the dialogue. No Country for Old Men is my personal favorite of their films, and one of the main reasons I like it so much is because the dialogue is so precisely and carefully written. Here, there are a number of times that the writing is more of a distraction than it is an aid in telling the story. The characters generally speak without contractions, making everything they say sound artificial and forced. It would be easy to ignore if it popped up here and there, but it’s through almost the entire movie. In that respect, this film reminded by quite a bit of the same issue I had with Guys and Dolls. The forced artificiality bothers me because it seems so unnecessary.

I like this film pretty well, but I do have to question what all the fuss was about, and this is coming from the perspective of someone who really likes the Coens. I at least like all of their films that I’ve seen, and some I genuinely love. This one, though, while good and enjoyable, doesn’t seem to be a film that rises to the level of required viewing. Well filmed, yes. Well acted, yes. Necessary? I’m not so sure.

It would, however, make a dandy double feature with Unforgiven.

Why to watch True Grit: A classic reborn modern.
Why not to watch: It’s reborn, but really, so what?

The Young Ones Fare Badly, Too

Film: No Country for Old Men
Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library on kick-ass portable DVD player.

There are, generally speaking, two opinions on No Country for Old Men. Some people (including me) will tell you that it’s the best thing the Coen Brothers have ever done. Others—many, many others—will tell you that the film is great until the last couple of minutes. What this means is that we’ll be getting to spoilers here eventually, because this is an ending that needs defending.

This film is the story of three men, none of whom appear on the screen at the same time. First we have Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin). Out hunting one day, he stumbles across a drug deal gone very wrong. Following the trail of the one man to walk out of the gunfight alive, he discovers a dead body and a satchel containing $2 million. Naturally he takes this home, but returns to the scene that night to see about a man still at the scene who was dying, but not yet dead. He’s discovered there by a pair involved with the trade, and he flees, returning home for the satchel. He also sends his wife Carla Jean (Kelly Macdonald) to her mother’s house to keep her safe.

We also meet the man who will spend most of the film pursuing Moss and the money: Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem). Chigurh is a hit man who has been hired to recover the money, and he is perhaps the most ruthless man ever portrayed in a film. Our first view of him is strangling a deputy with his handcuffs. He then steals a police car, pulls someone over, and kills him with a captive bolt pistol (usually used to slaughter livestock) and takes his car.

Our third character is Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones). He is a man who has aged into his job as sheriff, and comes from a line of lawmen in the region. He fills this role as sheriff of this expanse of Texas with a sort of resigned dignity, knowing that there will be violence that he must see to, and understanding it less and less every day.

Sheriff Ed Tom is on screen less than the other main characters, but it is he who stands at the heart of the film. He is the moral center of the action as well as the character we are most likely to attach to as the protagonist. In the role, Jones carries the weight of the area on his soul. This is a man broken down by what he has seen and knowing what he will see in the future, a man who can only react to the increasing horror of his work by strapping on his sidearm and continuing to walk forward into whatever the situation throws at him.

All of the performances are notable ones. Javier Bardem comes across as one of the purest incarnations of evil ever filmed. Chigurh has a particular code that he lives by. He is a ruthless killer, someone who destroys everything he sees simply because it might see him, but there is evident a twisted moral ethic by which he works. He kills with no pleasure in general (although there certainly seems to be some pleasure at the start), but rather with a sort of satisfaction in doing a particular job well.

As the story unfolds, Chigurh tracks Moss across Texas, following him by means of a transponder hidden in the money satchel. Moss demonstrates his own particular cunning, renting back-to-back rooms at a motel and shifting the money satchel through the air vent to keep it out of Chigurh’s hands. Along the way, we encounter Carson Wells (Woody Harrelson), sent to track down both the money and Anton Chigurh. Like Chigurh, Wells is ruthless and dedicated to his craft, but it’s also evident that he lacks the completely cold-blooded nature of Chigurh.

So let’s talk about that ending, shall we?

* * * A SPOILER FOR OLD MEN * * *

For many people the end of the film is a dud because there is no confrontation with Chigurh. At the end of the film, Chigurh is in a serious car accident, but he walks away, heading toward his next assignment. Moss is killed by Chigurh, and Ed Tom Bell retires.

So why is this such a great ending? Because it’s all about the opening narration from Ed Tom Bell. He tells us in the first few moments of the film that he is losing his ability to understand what is happening around him. He’s willing to die for the job if it becomes necessary, but as he tells us at the start, he doesn’t want to take his life into his own hands when he no longer understands the terms of the bet.

And so, the end, with no confrontation and Sheriff Bell’s retirement, we get the ending this film needs. Sheriff Bell no longer has a handle on the nature of the criminals he is seeing, and rather than risk being killed for something he cannot fathom, he hangs up his pistol. That is the entire point of the film—that Sheriff Bell is unable to determine a course of action and is equally unable to get a line on Chigurh and the people like him. It’s a stark and poignant moment, and it is truly what the story needs.

* * * NO MORE SPOILER FOR OLD MEN * * *

In short, I think this is the best thing the Coens have ever done. It follows the book it was based on religiously, and offers a new dark vision of what crime has become

Why to watch No Country for Old Men, The Coen Brothers have never been better.
Why not to watch: There’s a fair chance the ending will piss you off.

Lush, Lush Losers

Films: The Big Lebowski, Sideways
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on middlin’-sized living room television (Lebowski), DVD from Rockford Public Library on laptop (Sideways).

(Author’s note: I watched The Big Lebowski last week, but haven’t had time to write it up due to my schedule. When a quarter ends, I grade papers dawn to dusk, and movies make good background noise, but I don’t have time to wax philosophic about them. So, while these movies are being presented here on the same day, they were not watched this way.)


Genre bending isn’t easy. In fact, it’s so difficult that often, when a good filmmaker (or in this case, filmmakers) do it, it goes unnoticed. I’ve watched The Big Lebowski a few times, but never realized until this latest viewing that this is more than a really good comedy. This film is a comedy, a spoof of film noir, and an actual film noir itself. I was completely blown away when this hit me. The Coens are far better at what they do than I gave them credit for, and I already give them a lot of credit.

Jeff Lebowski (Jeff Bridges), better known as “The Dude” by everyone who has ever met him, finds himself in a great deal of trouble. Unbeknownst to him, the wife of a completely different Jeffery Lebowski has run up debts with a man named Jackie Treehorn. After a shopping trip for half-and-half, The Dude finds two men in his apartment demanding the money from The Dude’s non-existent wife. One of these men urinates on the rug, a tragedy for The Dude, because “that rug really tied the room together.”

The Dude tells his troubles to his bowling friends. These are the militant and stultifyingly blunt Walter (John Goodman) and the mousey, permanently behind-the-current-discussion Donny (Steve Buscemi). Walter suggests finding the other Jeffrey Lebowski to pay for the rug cleaning, and this is what drives the rest of the plot. All The Dude wants is his rug cleaned. He meets the real Jeffrey Lebowski (David Huddleston) and his assistant Brandt (Philip Seymour Hoffman), walks off with a rug, and meets Bunny (Tara Reid), the woman who has run up all the debts.

From here, things get crazy. Bunny Lebowski goes missing, and Jeffrey Lebowski hires The Dude to handle the ransom. Through a series of misadventures, mostly caused by Walter, bad things happen, the hand-off isn’t made, and life gets extremely weird for The Dude for the rest of the film. We encounter the sort of characters that can only exist in the world of the Coen brothers’ ideas.

Among these bizarre characters are a trio of German nihilists (Coen regular Peter Stormare, the awesome Flea, and Torsten Voges), their girlfriend (Aimee Mann), porn king Jackie Treehorn (Ben Gazzara), Jeffrey Lebowski’s extravagant artist daughter (Julianne Moore), flamboyant bowling pederast Jesus Quintana (John Turturro), and the country/western narrator (Sam Elliot). These are film characters rather than real characters, which often plays false to my mind, but the film is so broadly comic that the characters work here.

Despite the fact that everything here is comedic, the plot follows basic noir lines. Everything centers on the missing Bunny Lebowski and the equally missing million dollar ransom. No one is what they seem, and only through the white Russian and marijuana-fueled haze of The Dude’s world do we get any information. It takes him awhile to put everything together and put all of the players in their proper place. When the stoned-out, bombed-out Dude manages to think through everything in the end, it’s a magical moment.

Beyond the noir plot, you know, that whole “way the film works” thing that I completely overlooked every other time I’ve seen this film, what’s here is some of the greatest comedic moments in film from the past 20 years. The Dude is a quintessential movie character, someone who quickly became iconic—a drunk Indiana Jones or a fully stoned Napoleon Dynamite. The same is most definitely true of John Goodman’s portrayal of Walter. Walter obsesses over his comrades “dying face down in the mud in Viet Nam” and has charming character traits like pulling a gun on a fellow bowler who faults on his approach.

*** THE DUDE WANTS A SPOILER ***

The reason this film works as a noir is that it starts as a simple problem—get The Dude’s rug cleaned. But everything encountered is smoke and mirrors. Everything that is supposed to make things easier or solve problems proves to make them more difficult, and everything has a deeper meaning. Bunny Lebowski hasn’t been kidnapped. The German nihilists are trying to capitalize on her temporary disappearance, as is Jeffrey Lebowski, who has no money of his own and is desperate to steal the proposed ransom himself. Every simple problem has a complexity that lies under it. It’s noir, but slanted about 10 degrees to the left.

For instance, The Dude, like any noir gumshoe, gets assaulted multiple times and takes his fair share of beatings. However, rather than a series of smacks to the jaw, the assaults are often bizarre, like a ferret being dropped into his bathtub while he’s bathing. Any good noir detective gets the girl, as does The Dude. However, she’s not looking for a relationship—she just wants a baby with someone who won’t take an interest in raising the child. The bad guys aren’t vicious killers, but whiney jerks who get torn apart by a pissed-off Walter. All of the pieces are there; they’re just knocked loose and turned at odd, wonderful angles.

It’s interesting to note as well that Steve Buscemi tends to get killed in Coen movies, and each time, what’s left of him gets smaller and smaller. In Miller’s Crossing, he leaves a faceless body; in Fargo, all that’s left is a leg and a spray of blood and bone. Here, he is cremated, and all that’s left is his ashes.

*** THE DUDE ABIDES ***

I do enjoy this film. I think it’s a damn shame that it was removed from the main list. It should still be there.

It’s worth noting this, though: if you are offended by language, this is not a movie that you will enjoy. There is a tremendous amount of language in this film, to the tune of an f-bomb about every 30 seconds on average. That stuff washes over me completely, but I understand that there are people who are truly offended by it, so it’s worth the warning. If you can look past the language, I can’t imagine someone not finding this film entertaining.


On the other end of the boozy spectrum is Sideways. Rather than white Russians made with cheap half-and-half and cheaper vodka, we get drunken wine snobbery. Miles (Paul Giamatti) is a failed writer teaching eighth grade and still coming down off a marriage that didn’t work. His best friend, Jack (Thomas Haden Church), is an actor getting married in a week’s time. Miles and Jack are going to head up to wine country in California for a week of golf and wine tasting before the big event.

We discover early on that Jack really has different goals than Miles does. All Miles wants to do is show his friend a good time. Jack has decided that Miles, with his first novel sitting with a small publisher who may not want to print it and his prescriptions for a pair of anxiety/depression medications really needs to ditch the pills and the psychiatrist and just get himself old fashioned sexed up. Additionally, Jack is looking for a final casual fling or two before his big wedding day, and really doesn’t want the depressed Miles screwing this up.

Miles, in addition to his various foibles, is an unrelenting wine snob. As the pair drive through parts of Napa Valley, it appears that Miles is well known at every vineyard in the area. If this leads you to think that Miles has a drinking problem, you’d be correct. He does tip more than is fair share of bottles, but insists on drinking only the best. We learn that he is desperate in many ways when he and Jack stop by Miles’s mother’s house. Excusing himself from dinner, he sneaks into her bedroom and finds her private safe, peeling off about $1,000 in hundreds and pocketing them before rejoining the table.

At one restaurant, they meet Maya (Virginia Madsen), who is quite the cutie and is also evidently recently divorced. She’s obviously taken with Miles, although he doesn’t seem to be able to get past his own divorce to notice. At another stop, the pair meet up with Stephanie (Sandra Oh), who immediately clicks with Jack.

The obvious happens. Miles and Maya have a budding romance while Jack and Stephanie have good, old-fashioned lusty sex. It slips that Jack is a few days away from marriage, which cures Jack of nothing. It also slips that despite earlier comments, Miles’s book really isn’t “about to be published” but is only under consideration, and that’s hardly a sure thing.

The film is really about the downward trajectory of Miles’s life, his own personal failure to live up to what he wants out of life, and his self-immolation by wine bottle. Certainly there is the touch of the comic here, and many of the situations are really funny, as is a great deal of the dialogue. Smart dialogue is sometimes rare, and the conversations here are excellent, which is a large part of the charm.

Additionally, these are real characters instead of the broadly comic caricatures that frequently show up in Hollywood comedies. The characters are comic and tragic specifically because they are so completely real. Miles is smart and has done less with his life than he thinks he should have, and takes solace in knowing more about wine than anyone else he knows. Jack is a fun-loving goof, the guy who shrugs his shoulders and smiles when he gets his hand stuck in the cookie jar. Maya is sweet, open, and honest, and completely genuine.

There’s a lovely metaphor about halfway into the film. Maya asks Miles why he’s so into pinots. He answers that it’s a difficult grape to grow—they’re fragile and weak, and require constant care and attention, and only certain people are capable of doing anything with them. It’s unspoken, of course, but the brittle and fractured Miles is himself like this fragile grape, so ready to give up and die unless cared for. We get the same metaphor from Maya when she explains why she loves wine—about how it is a constantly living, evolving thing that changes constantly until it peaks, and starts its slow decline, not unlike a person. This too might be a metaphor for Miles, and the rest of the movie is there to determine if he is still evolving or if that decline has started.

Much of the success of Sideways comes from the actors playing these roles. I’m a big fan of Paul Giamatti. I think he’s made some really poor choices for film roles in the past, but he’s also made some great ones. He tends to fail when he takes broadly comic roles—actually, I think he fails when he plays anything broadly. Films like Big Fat Liar, Planet of the Apes, and Shoot ‘Em Up fail to play to his strengths. Where Giamatti is really successful is in roles like this one, or similar lovable loser roles in films like American Splendor and Winchell. He’s also excellent in straight dramatic roles. If he’d stick to roles like these, he might end up being typecast, but he’d always be worth watching.

I feel similarly about Thomas Haden Church. He works well in roles where he can be subtle and funny, and less well in films like Spider-Man 3. He’s certainly capable of comedy, and he’s good in comedy, but he’s a much better actor than he often gets credit for. Virginia Madsen shows here that she is capable of a performance with some heart and subtlety, and I like her in the role.

And then there’s Sandra Oh. She’s good here, and I can’t dispute it, but there’s something about her I find really disconcerting and weird. She always looks to me like she’s just smelled something unpleasant, like her companion has floated an air biscuit and she’s trying not to let anyone know. I feel the same way (actually, far more intensely) about Renee Zellweger, who looks either like she’s just left an unclean bathroom or she’s finished sucking on half a lemon. There’s something about these two actors that make my hand ball up into a fist. I’m not justifying this, and I realize it’s irrational. I can’t control it, but the first step to a problem like this is admitting that the problem exists, right?

Ultimately, Sideways works because it isn’t a traditional Hollywood movie and it avoids the traditional Hollywood ending. The ending is instead quite realistic, believable, and oddly uplifting. It also has one of the great tragic moments ever filmed, a moment best left to spoilers.

*** OPENING A BOTTLE OF PINOT ***

Miles has a prized bottle of wine that he had been saving for his 10th anniversary with his wife. When he realizes that she has not only remarried but is pregnant, and thus lost to him forever, he cracks the bottle and drinks it from a Styrofoam cup at a fast food restaurant. It’s so sad and painful, and yet perfectly human and believable.

*** THE BOTTLE IS EMPTY ***

This is a bittersweet film spiced with smart comedy, coming mostly from the realistic and entertaining dialogue between Miles and Jack. All of the elements of this film blend together into something bigger and better than any individual element. Like a great wine (at least from what I’ve been told—I can’t tell a $50 bottle from two-buck Chuck), the end product is far more than what the bottle appears to hold.

Why to watch The Big Lebowski: It’s funny. It’s really, really funny. And it’s the weirdest noir you’ll ever see.
Why not to watch: More language than you might expect.

Why to watch Sideways: It’s human, meaning it’s funny and tragic in equal doses.
Why not to watch: If you know nothing about wine, it will give you an oenological hangover.

Smart Hicks in Coen-ville

Films: O Brother Where Art Thou, Raising Arizona
Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library (Brother), DVD from personal collection (Arizona) on big ol’ television.

When I think of the directors I really like, there are a handful who, as far as I’ve seen, can do almost nothing wrong. Scorsese hits on all cylinders most of the time, as does Guillermo del Toro, Danny Boyle, Hitchcock, and a few others. There are few I love as much as the Coen Brothers, though. Joel and Ethan Coen know what they’re doing. They write well, direct well, produce well, and make me damn happy.

What I find interesting about the Coens is that they are equally at home with drama and comedy. Their first movie, Blood Simple, is one of the great debuts in movie history. In the same vein, they created Miller’s Crossing and No Country for Old Men. Comedy-wise, there’s The Hudsucker Proxy, Burn After Reading, The Big Lebowski, and these two films. In between, there’s Fargo.

Just as many directors have muses, so too do the Coens. A lot of the same people turn up over and over in their films. John Turturro, John Goodman, Holly Hunter, Francis McDormand, and others seem to keep showing up over and over in Coen films. There has to be some particular joy for an actor knowing that one of the best directors going likes having you around and continues to write great parts for you.

O Brother Where Art Thou is essentially a retelling of The Odyssey to the point that Homer is given partial writing credit for the film. We have a trio of ne’er-do-wells who have escaped from a prison chain gang. The leader is Ulysses Everett McGill (George Clooney), a slick talking, educated man with a penchant for complex sentences and advanced vocabulary. Accompanying him are Delmar (Tim Blake Nelson) and Pete (John Turturro). They go with Everett because they’re chained to him, and because he promises them a third share of $1.2 million from an armed car robbery. However, they need to get to where it was buried quickly because a new dam is being built, and the land will soon be covered by a manmade lake.

Along the way, the three meet up with characters of all stripes and deal with terrible odds preventing their success. All of this is predicted by a blind man on a handcart who tells them they will find a great treasure, but not the one they seek, a reference to the blind poet Homer. They meet with sirens, who spirit Pete away, a cyclops in the form of Big Dan Teague (John Goodman), see the murder of innocent livestock as with the slaughter of the cattle of Helios (here at the hands of Babyface Nelson, played by Michael Badalucco) and more. Even Circe is referenced when Delmar is convinced that Pete has been transformed into a toad.

The big reference, though is Everett’s wife Penny (Odysseus’s wife was named Penelope). She’s set to marry another man, which is the real reason Everett broke out of prison in the first place. Just as Penelope fended off suitors until her husband returned and proved himself, Everett must prove himself a man in her eyes to prevent her marriage. He does this because of a chance of fate. A meeting with a young man at a crossroads and a desire for instant cash turn the three with their new friend Tommy (Chris Thomas King) into The Soggy Bottom Boys, the hottest singing act to ever hit Mississippi.

There are great cameos littered through this film as well. Stephen Root plays the man who first records the Soggy Bottom Boys. Charles Durning shows up as the governor of Mississippi. The underrated and virtually unknown Daniel von Bargen (you’ll know him the minute you see him) plays the evil pursuing sheriff dedicated to finding and killing Everett and his friends, essentially acting as Poseidon in his wrath against Odysseus.

Here’s the thing: even without all of the references to Homer’s work, this is a great movie. It’s perfectly possible to enjoy the hell out of this movie without knowing anything about classic Greek literature. It’s also worth noting that this is the first time in a long time I’ve had any desire to go out and purchase a movie soundtrack. It’s that good all the way through.

Raising Arizona was my first encounter with the Coens as a director/producer team (Joel Coen was the assistant editor on The Evil Dead). Despite multiple viewings, I still love this movie, and it still kills me every time I watch it. Of all the Coen films, this one is the most quotable, the one filled with lines that seem suitable in a variety of situations.

H.I. “Hi” McDunnough (Nicolas Cage) is a small-time crook constantly arrested for armed robbery. He’s only technically armed, though; there’s never any ammunition in the gun. Every time he is picked up, he’s photographed by Edwina (Holly Hunter), whose conversation with him consists of a shouted “Turn to the right!” Eventually, Hi confesses his love for her, and when he’s released again, the two are married. They move into a trailer and await the coming of children.

Sadly, Ed is barren. At the same time, a local unpainted furniture magnate named Nathan Arizona (Trey Wilson) and his wife are blessed with quintuplets. Ed wants a baby, and since Hi has a criminal past, she convinces him that the only thing to do is to sneak into the Arizona mansion and steal one of the babies so they can raise it as their own.

The problem is that everyone wants the baby. Two of Hi’s prison friends break out and visit the couple. Gale (John Goodman) and Evelle (William Forsythe) want the child for their own. So too do Glen (Sam McMurray) and Dot (Frances McDormand), who know the real identity of the child and threaten to turn Ed and Hi in if they don’t get the baby. Arizona wants his child back and hires Leonard Smalls (Tex Cobb), a rough and dirty assassin on a Harley, to get the child back at all costs.

And so, it’s a comedy of errors. Hi and Ed do everything they can to make their lives happy with a child, and at every turn, everyone they encounter wants to take the child away from them. Of course, the child isn’t theirs to begin with (although as Hi says after the kidnapping, he got a good one). This leads to more theft, another convenience store robbery, more kidnappings, chases, fights, and an explosion or two.

It also leads to a tremendous amount of hick philosophizing from Hi in the form of voice over. It’s these in general that kill me. Some of the comments are staggeringly funny and are certainly meant to be, but for the characters in the film, they are said in all earnestness. Hi is sincere when he complains that Edwina is a rocky place where his seed could not find purchase, and when he does this, it renders me incapacitated with laughter.

I don’t usually like Nicolas Cage. He tends to overact and he also tends to make really crappy movies. His output for a great deal of his career has consisted of overblown action films short on plot and far too long on budget. He could be better as this film proves, but he typically isn’t. It makes me sad that someone could be producing great work over and over again—he’s made other movies worth watching—but instead makes crap that’s not worth the popcorn I spill when walking out. Do better, Cage. Make the Coens want to work with you again.

Why to watch O Brother Where Art Thou: A modern classic, and a classic brought to modern times.
Why not to watch: You can’t get beyond the bluegrass.

Why to watch Raising Arizona: The funniest thing the Coens ever did.
Why not to watch: It’s hard to believe that Nicolas Cage didn’t always suck really hard.