Review of O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) by Simeon T — 02 Mar 2015

Really good. Not as good as many think, but its a good-humoured, excellent looking, well-designed period piece which takes the template of the Odyssey and plays it for laughs without glossing over the danger and darkness of the deep south at the time. The three leads are terrific, especially Tim Blake Nelson, who's performance one could derive great pleasure and enjoyment from (the movie is quotable). The supporting characters are mostly memorable, from Charles Durning's really funny turn as the rotund incumbent Governor of Mississippi (surrounded by even more rotund advisors) to John Goodman's dastardly, Cyclopean bible salesman, to a welcome appearance by Daniel Van Bargen, a longtime favorite of mine, as one of those creepy southern cops who might be old scratch himself.

Its not a perfect movie. At times it is made with too light a touch, and little of the humour is of the belly laugh variety. I maintain the Coen Brothers are confectioneers who, while undoubtedly clever and original, tend in most of their films to dance along the surface rather than hitting you in the gut on either a comedic or dramatic level. The weakest element to me is the Holly Hunter character. She is played well, but is really annoying, which is a problem because as with the Odyssey the driving force of the journey is the central hero's need to return to his wife. But who would risk their life to return to this prissy, materialistic caricature? I found the whole wedding ring scene cringe-worthy and very reminiscent of Portia's lengthy jewelry inquisition in "Merchant of Venice". This is much less of a problem here, because she's a bit character rather than the central heroine. But it is a problem due to the thrust of the story.

With the problems out of the way, this is a nice little movie, well acted with terrific dialogue and quite pleasing visually and aurally. Speaking of the latter, there is some terrific music, which itself is enough reason to see the movie/buy the soundtrack. Better yet, some of the best music is mixed with the comedy, which as I said isn't uproarious but is consistently chuckle-worthy. So not a great movie but very good in many different ways.