Review of Barton Fink (1991) by Lorenzo V — 21 Aug 2012

"I've always found that writing comes from a great inner pain.".

Set in 1941, a newly successful New York playwright accepts an offer to write movie scripts in LA, and finds himself with writer's block when required to do a B-movie wrestling script, the only relief coming from a traveling salesman living next door.

REVIEW.

The most original effort yet (at the time of its release) from erstwhile genre robbers Joel and Ethan Coen is a striking parody of the creative process, and one of the few films to successfully probe the mind of a writer...ironically, by showing him not writing. The title character is an idealistic New York playwright summoned to Hollywood in the 1930s and suffering writer's block after being commissioned to script a Wallace Beery wrestling picture. He's an artist out of touch with reality trapped in a city out of touch with reality, and his massive creative block (plus his subsequent anxiety) is aggravated by the stifling environment and unrealistic expectations: how can he write anything when the producer of Capitol Pictures (scene stealer Michael Lerner) is, literally, kissing his feet?

The big tease about 'the box' and its contents is little more than just that, and the bloody death of Judy Davis doesn't present the shock of truth it's meant to have: for several scenes afterward it could almost be another of Fink's paranoid delusions. But unlike the merely visual wallpaper of their earlier movies, the Coen's patented mock portentous attitude and tongue-in-cheek claustrophobia is at least made to serve a purpose, becoming the perfect manifestation of (in Capitol Pictures mogul Jack Lipnick's phrase) "that Barton Fink feeling.".