The greed, duplicitous plotting, double crossing, and murder in Fargo make that film feel like a Shakespearian tragedy, so, in retrospect, it seems obvious that the Coens would tackle the Scottish play, one of the Bard’s most famous and celebrated works.
Only, for the first time in their filmmaking lives, The Tragedy of Macbeth isn’t a collaboration between the Coen brothers. After nearly four decades of making movies together, The Tragedy of Macbeth is the first solo film by Joel Cohen. His stripped down, almost ascetic, version of the Shakespeare work is, simply put, a masterpiece.
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Joel and Ethan Coen have put their inimitable stamp on just about every film genre there is. Their movie The Ballad of Buster Scruggs isn’t even really their first attempt at an anthology. They previously turned in a segment in two different anthology collections. The first was for the film Paris, je t’aime, where each story is set in the City of Lights. The second was a three minute short for a film commissioned as a celebration of the 60th anniversary of the Cannes Film Festival, called Chacun son cinema.
Scruggs, however, is all Coen Brothers, from start to finish. The film contains no out-and-out clunkers, but, as is the case with most anthologies, the whole is a bit uneven.
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Hail, Caesar is the Coen brothers’ first pure farcical comedy since 2008’s Burn After Reading, and it’s their best work in the style since 1998’s The Big Lebowski. You don’t need a detailed understanding of, or obsession with, Hollywood history (especially the late ‘40s and early ‘50s) to fully enjoy the movie, but it certainly helps. Hail, Caesar is a bit inside baseball, to borrow sports terminology, for those who don’t claim to be cinephiles. The references range from Busby Berkeley choreography to the singing and dancing cowboy movie star to a central plot point revolving around the Hollywood anti-communist blacklist, all staples of Hollywood at the time. Even movie extras are lampooned, described by one character as being untrustworthy. There are enough laughs, however, to ensure almost anyone can enjoy the picture. Not to mention the performances of the expertly cast ensemble, and the propulsive energy of the madcap story.
Set in 1951, Hail, Caesar details two days in the life of Capital Pictures head of production and “fixer” Eddie Mannix. Whether it’s figuring out a plan to hide the out-of-wedlock pregnancy of America’s sweetheart, or forcing the effete director of high-society melodramas to accept a Roy Rogers type as his new leading man, it’s all in a day’s work for Mannix. Josh Brolin was born for the role of studio honcho Mannix. His taciturn demeanor, yet emotive face, turn the character into a living, breathing relic from another age. The Coens use Eddie as a way to explore the hard-driven 1950s business man – imagine if Mad Men’s Don Draper had decided to go into the movie business instead of advertising – while putting their own indelible comedic spin on him. Mannix loves his job, but realizes it forces him to neglect his wife and kids. Actress Alison Pill turns up in one brief scene as Connie, Eddie’s wife, and in less than three minutes she manages to convey a lifetime of quiet desperation. If all that seems a little heavy for a fast-paced farce, don’t fret. Eddie (and the movie) is caught up in hijinks hilarious enough to fill two slapstick comedies.
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