Blood Simple review

 Number 586 on the top 1000 films of all time is the neo-noir 'Blood Simple.'

Barman Ray (John Getz) is having an affair with his boss Marty's (Dan Hedaya) wife Abby (Frances Mcdormand.) Upon discovering this, Marty arranges sleazy PI Loren Visser (M. Emmet Walsh) to kill them both.

Blood Simple was the directorial debut of the Coen Brothers. They also wrote and produced the film. And they certainly laid the groundwork for their future careers. This was long before they were winning Academy Awards or creating the most surreal of cinema, but they set the stage for things to come.

Often I find Coen Brothers' films too zany and weird, but Blood Simple was relatively straightforward. Or as straightforward as any noir film can be. As one can expect, Blood Simple has many twists and turns although it all makes sense in the end. I think...kinda...

Speaking of debuts, this was also the screen debut of the always terrific Frances Mcdormand. Just like the Coen Brothers, she was laying the groundwork for her future career. What an illustrious career it has been. She remains one of only three actors to win three Best Acting Oscars - sharing the honour with Katherine Hepburn and Daniel Day-Lewis. Standing on shoulders of giants to say the least... 

Along with Katy Hepburn, Frances Mcdormand has really improved representation of women characters on-screen. Long gone are the days of women either being dumb blondes, sex objects or scream queens. The likes of Mcdormand and Hepburn proved that women are capable of playing just as interesting, tough and fully-formed characters as men do. 

Abby is no exception. She's more than capable of protecting herself from all the sleazy men in her life - you only need to look at how she deals with the sleazy PI Visser. He is just one of the many sleazy men in Abby's life - all played by relatively unknown actors who haven't gone onto have the same careers as Frances Mcdormand.

It's a credit to the Coen Brothers that they were able to write, produce and direct, such a thrilling and inventive neo-noir film with such an unknown cast.

Barton Fink review

 Number 548 on the top 1000 films of all time is the Coen Brothers' black-comedy Barton Fink.

Barton Fink (John Turturro) is an aspiring screen-writer who finally gets his big break in Hollywood. However, the true reality of Hollywood screen-writing is far removed from the dream. Jon Polito and John Goodman co-star.

In the pantheon of Coen Brothers' films, I would rank this as one of their lower-tiered efforts. The brothers are well-known for their surreal films like Oh brother, wherefore art thou or The Big Lebowski, as well as more straightforward films like Miller's Crossing and No Country for Old Men. Barton Fink seemed to straddle both worlds without really landing in either.

Barton soon becomes mixed-up in a murder which sees him strike up an unusual friendship with the gregarious Charlie Meadows (John Goodman) which, in fairness, does finish in a fiery and dreamscape climax. Yet the earlier parts of the film deal with more grounded ideas like Barton trying to write a script to appease the big-shot Hollywood producer Jack Lipnick (Michael Lerner.) If the film could have been surreal or straightforward, I would have been okay with it, but not both.

John Turturro and Jon Polito also starred in Miller's Crossing - a prohibition-era gangster film. Both of them were terrific bringing frenetic energy to the role. They were memorable. Here I can't say the same. Granted Jon Polito was only a supporting character - a lackey to Michael Lerner, but he didn't bring the same energy to the role. Neither did Turturro. They played the roles with restraint when excess would have been better.

That summarises my criticism of this film really: it tried to be too many things and ended up being hardly anything.

Miller's Crossing review

 Number 391 on the top 1000 films of all time is the Coen Brothers' 1990 neo-noir gangster film Miller's Crossing.

Set in prohibition-era America, Miller's Crossing follows Tom Reagan (Gabriel Byrne) right-hand man to Irish mobster Leo O'Bannon (Albert Finney) as O'Bannon wars with rival Italian gangster Johnny Casper (Jon Polito.) Reagan desperately tries to stay alive as he plays off the two sides against each other. Marcia Gay Harden and John Turturro co-star.

Miller's Crossing comes quite early in the Coen Brothers' career - being only the third film they made. As such, I would argue it was one of their more straightforward films. Unlike their later efforts of the Big Lebowski, Fargo and Oh Brother, where art thou, there was far less off-the-beat humour and far less surrealism. This made it an enjoyable and engaging gangster flick made at a time where they had some stiff competition from the likes of Goodfellas, Carlito's Way and Casino. The 90's was a hell of a time for gangster films for sure.

Yet what separated Miller's Crossing was not only the prohibition setting but its also strong cast. A highlight among them was Jon Polito who brought a brilliant, maverick energy to Caspar. It was the perfect balance to veteran English actor Albert Finney who gave a calm and measured performance as the far older Leo O'Bannon. John Turturro was also great as bookie Bernie Bernbaum. He soon makes an enemy of Caspar by continuously skimming off his match-fixing winnings. It looks like Bernbaum is nothing more than a greedy schnook, but he proves himself to be cleverer than meets the eye.

And nowhere is this more true than with our protagonist Tom Reagan. Although he begins as a close ally of O'Bannon, he soon realises that he has to play both sides if he has any chance of surviving this growing mob-war. In 2009, the Guardian labelled Gabriel Byrne one of the best actors to have never received an Oscar nomination (but bear in mind this article is years out of date) and he was good in this film. It's a fair comment as Byrne plays the man caught between two sides very well. And a quick shoutout to Marcia Gay Harden who would go onto prove why she later went onto win a Best Supporting Actress Oscar.

Although it might have lacked some of the surreal humour that the Coen Brothers are so well-known for, it still had the same stylistic flair they're so well-known for. The dialogue was sharp and snappy and its cinematography and style have been emulated well in future decades. Did the scenes in the titular Miller's Crossing remind anybody of a certain episode of the Sopranos?

Miller's Crossing might have been one of the Coen Brother's earliest films before we really knew what they had to say as film-makers, but it was certainly an enjoyable enough effort. And they showed why, like Marcia Gay Harden, they went onto win Oscars of their own.

Paris, je t'aime

 Number 618 on the top 1000 films of all time is the anthology film 'Paris je T'aime.'

Paris, je t'aime is a collection of eighteen short films all set in Paris and exploring the theme of love. Each film has its own director and cast. Directors include the Coen Brothers, Alfonso Cuaron and Gerald Depardieu. Some cast members include Maggie Gyllenhaal, Natalie Portman, Steve Buscemi, Rufus Sewell and Emily Mortimer.

In a film containing eighteen short films, it is inevitable that some would be better than others and that was certainly the case here. However, it didn't always come down to overall quality, but ]how some of the films were structured. Some of them were full stories with a beginning, middle and the end. Others just seemed to have a beginning. They left me asking "is that it?"

The obvious example is director Gurinda Chadha's short film: Quais de Seine where a young man befriends a Muslim woman. The short film centres on the beginning of their friendship and that's where it ends. Obviously, it is only a short film, but I think it could have explored their relationship further.

The same could be said for Le Marais where a Frenchman speaks candidly to a new colleague believing he has found a kindred spirit. This story could have used a bit more foundation to have been truly effective. It had a good middle and ending, but the beginning needed more work.

Out of the eighteen films, I have three favourites: Tuileres by the Coen Brothers which starred Steve Buscemi as an American tourist who breaks the cardinal rule of never looking at somebody on the Paris Metro. It had all the trademark surrealism and humour that we would expect to see from the Coen Brothers. Secondly, there was Alfonso Cuaron's one-take Parc Monceau focussing on the relationship between an older man (Nick Nolte) and younger woman Ludivine Sagnier which was topped off with a clever twist, and the emotionally powerful Place Des Victories where a young mother comes to terms with her son's death.

The nature of an anthology film means that it allows different directors to interpret the theme of love in so many different ways. This led to some truly creative and kooky ideas. No more so than with Quartier de la Madeline which saw Elijah Wood falling in love with a vampire. It was a wonderful exercise in creativity.

Overall, Paris Je T'aime is an entertaining if uneven collection of stories set in the city of love.