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Ten Days Of The Coen Brothers: Day Five

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10 years ago

March 2, 2016

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Coming In From The Cold

♦ With the release of Hail, Caesar! in the UK on 4 March, Tripwire kicks off a look at all of the Coen Brothers films released to date. Yesterday we took a look at their fifth film The Hudsucker Proxy (1994) and now our editor-in-chief Joel Meadows takes a look at their sixth effort, Fargo (1996).

Fargo

Director: Joel Coen

Stars: William H Macy, Frances McDormand, Steve Buscemi

Two years after The Hudsucker Proxy came Fargo, a dark comedy murder thriller set in the wilds of Minnesota. William H Macy plays shady car salesman Jerry Lundegaard who comes a cropper when he tries to arrange the kidnapping of his wife Jean (Kristin Rudrüd). However Lundegaard doesn’t count on the perspicacity of pregnant police chief Marge Gunderson (Frances McDormand, aka Mrs Joel Coen) or the incompetence of the two thugs he hired to carry out the kidnapping, Carl Showalter (Coens regular Steve Buscemi) and the wonderfully monikered Gaear Grimsrud (Peter Stormare).

Fargo is a very frustrating film. Retreading some of the same ground arguably as their debut Blood Simple, the Coens have obviously found their style by this point but it all feels a little obvious and predictable. They do make a lot of the bleak and unforgiving setting but despite some strong performances from Macy and a solid one from McDormand, there is something lacking here. It looks wonderful thanks to the extremely talented, award-winning cinematographer Roger Deakins, and the music by Coens regular Carter Burwell lends an extra layer to proceedings, but all of this isn’t quite enough. They do invert the mystery genre a little with its uncompromising backdrop, but the characters who occupy the story are not as compelling as some of their other creations.

I shall give the film a little extra credit though, as interestingly it did spawn the vastly superior TV show of the same name. The dramatis personae work better on the small screen, with more room to breath than in a 100 minute film. So Fargo is still worth seeing but it pales when compared with any of their stronger efforts.

JOEL MEADOWS