Review of The Hudsucker Proxy (1994) by Vagelakis — 19 Sep 2011

As one of the Coen's early films, The Hudsucker Proxy has their trademark of strange and sometimes dark comedy and attracting style in terms of look and imagery. However I didn't like the film as much as I had hoped to.

Tim Robbins was fine and Paul Newman certainly did a great job, but Jennifer Jason Leigh's performance came off a little too much for me... I guess I was a little annoyed by her? Anyways the film has a lot of great ideas and is an interesting concept from the get go, but I thought the film felt a little too.

.. well, Gilliam. Yes, that's right I felt at times like I was watching a Terry Gilliam film, and I certainly have no problem with Gilliam, he has an bizarrely artistic craft to his films, but this is a Coen film, and while there are traces of their style too as I've mentioned, it shifts quite a lot.

In the end, I felt that style outweighed the substance of the film, which was a little minimal in comparison. Overall I feel a little mixed about it, but I guess I somewhat liked it, I enjoyed its whacky style at times as well as dark comedy and it has an original feel to it.

Whether I recommend this film or not, it's hard to say. For curiosity, absolutely, I'm sure some people will enjoy its strange Gilliam-like style, but it's simple to say it's one of the Coen's less approachable films.

Nevertheless I'd say it makes the cut as a fairly good film, but I somehow feel that there's an underrated triumph buried deep in the heart of the film, which makes me think twice about how I feel about it.

I'm sure that I can get a lot more out of it through a second watch, but until than I can only stick with what I've said.