With producer, co-writer and brother Ethan, writer-director Joel Coen was part of the most celebrated brother act in recent entertainment memory. He helmed a series of stylish, irreverent and cinema-savvy movies that never failed to charm critics while thrilling an initially small, but loyal band of viewers. Though they have evinced a powerful fascination with film genres - particularly screwball comedy and film noir - the Coen Brothers earned a great deal of respect by the Hollywood community, despite their penchant to work outside the system. These self-conscious movies-within-movies possessed humorous camera movements, richly textured landscapes and powerhouse performers spouting beautifully artificial dialogue. While some have complained that the brothers were nothing more than slick stylists, the Coens nonetheless achieved a rare feat in entertainment: making the movies they wanted to make with little-to-no outside interference.
Born on Nov. 29, 1954 in St. Louis Park, MN, Joel was the first brother to emerge from his mother's womb, followed by Ethan three years later. Both grew up in an academic home - their father, Edward, was an economics professor at the University of Minnesota, and their mother, Rena, was an art history professor at St. Cloud State. Growing up, the Coen Brothers displayed exceptional intelligence that somehow managed to translate into mediocre grades, thanks in part to a minor obsession with watching movies on television. In their early teens, the Coens mowed lawns and saved their money to buy a Super-8 camera, which they used to remake several of their favorite films, including "Naked Prey" and "Lassie Come Home." They also churned out a slew of originals like "Henry Kissinger - Man on the Go," "Lumberjacks of the North" and "The Banana Film." With Ethan three years behind him, Joel attended Bard College at Simon's Rock, a school for gifted high school age students in Great Barrington, MA.
After leaving Bard College, Joel went to New York City where he enrolled at New York University to study film. Joel pretty much kept to himself, making little impression among his teachers and classmates - all the better for him, because he was given equipment to do what he wanted unencumbered, a precursor of things to come. His most notable accomplishment at NYU was "Soundings," a 30-minute black-and-white film about a deaf man whose girlfriend verbally fantasizes about his roommate in the other room while having sex. Joel graduated with his degree and hung around New York, working as a production assistant on various local productions. He was hired to work for Barry Sonnenfeld on an industrial film, who later said that Joel was "without a doubt the worst P.A. I ever worked with." Eventually, he became an assistant editor for Edna Paul, who specialized in low-budget horror movies, which in turn led to his meeting director Sam Raimi.
By this time, Ethan had joined Joel in New York after graduating Princeton with a degree in philosophy. The brothers began writing scripts in their spare time, eventually churning out the pages for what became their first film, "Blood Simple." Inspired by the hard-boiled noir of novelist James M. Cain, "Blood Simple" was a dark, twisting tale about a Texas bar owner (Dan Hedaya) who hires a private detective (M. Emmet Walsh) to kill his wife (Frances McDormand) and her lover (John Getz), only to bear the brunt of a surprising double-cross that ultimately leads to a sadistic and darkly ironic end. Joel and Ethan wrote the script for "Blood Simple" in 1981, then had Sonnenfeld - who was at that time strictly a cinematographer - shoot a short trailer for the film, which they used to raise $750,000 from all and sundry. After shooting in and around Austin, TX in 1983, the Coens' debut film made its way through the festival circuit, including the US Film Festival - which eventually became Sundance - where it won the Grand Jury Prize for Best Film. With an acrobatic camera, lean dialogue and absurdly comic violence, "Blood Simple" firmly established Joel and Ethan as talented filmmakers right from the get-go. And for Joel, the film introduced him to his future wife, leading lady McDormand, who would go on to star in many of the brothers' films.
After penning the script to Sam Raimi's "Crimewave" (1985), a slapstick comedy about hitmen, Joel and Ethan moved onto their next project, "Raising Arizona" (1987), a screwball comedy about a petty crook (Nicolas Cage) and his corrections officer wife (Holly Hunter) who are unable to conceive, leading to their kidnapping of an infant from a family of sextuplets. Once again, the Coens utilized Sonnenfeld's jumpy camera to great effect, creating a highly-energized, almost cartoonish movement that served as a perfect compliment to the film's outlandish premise, stylized dialogue and over-the-top performances. Either loved or hated by fans and critics, there was no mistaking that "Raising Arizona" solidified Joel and Ethan's standing as true auteurs. They followed with perhaps their most understated project to date, "Miller's Crossing" (1990), a lush, elegant yarn set in an unnamed city in 1929, about an Irish mobster (Albert Finney) and his brooding right hand (Gabriel Byrne), who have a falling out over a woman (Marcia Gay Harden) while trying to fend off the Italian boss (Jon Polito) in a citywide gang war. Though not as revered as their later work, "Miller's Crossing," nonetheless, demonstrated the Coens' ability to jump from genre to genre with ease.
Writing the script for "Miller's Crossing" proved to be a difficult task, however, prompting Joel and Ethan to take three weeks off and write what became their next film, "Barton Fink" (1991). A satire about a New York playwright (John Turturro) hired by a Hollywood mogul (Michael Lerner) to write a wrestling picture, only to struggle with writer's block in his seedy hotel room, "Barton Fink" was ultimately a metaphor for the brothers' own frustrations with writing "Miller's Crossing." The film earned Joel and Ethan a Palm d'Or for Best Director(s) at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival. Meanwhile, they moved on to make "The Hudsucker Proxy" (1994), their first film with a substantial budget ($30 million) and a big time Hollywood producer (Joel Silver). A madcap send-up of Frank Capra and Howard Hawks-esque films about an idealistic, but dopey mailroom clerk (Tim Robbins) promoted to president by the head of a major company (Paul Newman) in an effort to devalue their stock, "The Hudsucker Proxy" bombed at the box office and gave the Coens their first brush with financial disaster.
The Coens' failure was fleeting, however, thanks to what ultimately became their seminal feature, "Fargo" (1996). Returning to their Minnesota roots, Joel and Ethan fashioned a taut and quirky tale about Jerry Lundegaard, (William H. Macy), a Minneapolis car salesman in over his head in debt who hires two thugs (a yammering Steve Buscemi and a taciturn Peter Stormare) to kidnap his own wife (Kristen Rudrud) in order to secure a large ransom from her wealthy father (Harve Presnell). The scheme falls apart, however, after the two thugs shoot a highway patrolman and two hapless passers-by, which leads Marge Gunderson (Frances McDormand), a very pregnant local police chief, to investigate and ultimately unravel Jerry's increasingly botched plan. Because of its folksy charm, stunningly shot landscapes of snow and ice, and a twisting plot of a crime gone wrong, "Fargo" was hailed by both audiences and critics on its way to earning a slew of awards, including two Academy Awards for Best Actress (McDormand) and Best Original Screenplay. The film became a true high-water mark for Joel and Ethan, both in terms of creative and financial success, and allowed the brothers artistic freedom heretofore unseen.
Building off the success of "Fargo," Joel and Ethan went to work on their next feature, "The Big Lebowski" (1998), a return to their peculiar mix of screwball comedy, absurdist theatrics and unflinching violence. In this yarn about a stoner private investigator (Jeff Bridges) known as "The Dude," the laziest man in Los Angeles, the Coens pulled out all the stops with their characters, throwing into the comic tale of embezzlement and deception a gun-loving Zionist (John Goodman), a lurid bowling champ (John Turturro), and a trio of German nihilists (Torsten Voges, Peter Stormare and Flea) prone to violence and urinating on rugs. Though not a financial windfall upon release, "Lebowski" would become a cult favorite with die-hard cinephiles upon its release to video and DVD. For their next project, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" (2000), the Coens tapped the star power of George Clooney to play the leader of three cons (Turturro and Tim Blake Nelson rounding out the threesome) who have escaped from a chain gang and record a hit record while hunting down a fortune in buried treasure. Inspired by Preston Sturges' "Sullivan's Travels" (1941) and Homer's The Odyssey - which they later claimed was a joke because they never actually read it - "O Brother" was a rare financial boon for the Coens, earning over $45 million at the box office and spawning a Grammy-winning soundtrack.
Continuing to revisit and revise the film genres they admired as kids, Joel and Ethan turned to 1940s noir for "The Man Who Wasn't There" (2001), a darkly comic story about Ed Crane (Billy Bob Thornton), a barber in small town Northern California, dissatisfied with life and seemingly invisible to friends and neighbors. But when he suspects his wife (Frances McDormand) of infidelity, Crane hatches a blackmail scheme that suddenly turns to murder. With "Intolerable Cruelty" (2003), the Coens produced a surprisingly run-of-the-mill effort in this screwball comedy about a fast-talking divorce lawyer (George Clooney) in a battle of the sexes with the gold-digging wife (Catherine Zeta-Jones) of a wealthy client (Edward Herrman). After providing uncredited rewrite work on "Bad Santa" (2003), Joel and Ethan made "The Ladykillers" (2004), a remake of the Alec Guinness-Peter Sellers film of the same name from 1955. Tom Hanks elevated an otherwise mediocre effort as a smooth-talking college professor who assembles a gang of experts for the heist of the century, only to be stymied by an obstinate landlady (Irma P. Hall).
Thanks to "The Man Who Wasn't There, "Intolerable Cruelty" and "The Ladykillers," the Coen Brothers hit a creative lull. Everything changed, however, with their excellent adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's terse novel, "No Country For Old Men" (2007). With surprisingly little dialogue - the film faithfully stuck to McCarthy's laconic style - "No Country" told the story of Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin), a down-and-out Vietnam veteran who finds a briefcase containing $2 million in the desert near the remains of a bloody drug deal gone bad. Taking the satchel of cash only makes Moss' life worse, forcing him to elude all manner of pursuers, including a deadly assassin (Javier Bardem) who flips coins for human lives and a disillusioned West Texas sheriff (Tommy Lee Jones) at the end of his tether. "No Country for Old Men" marked a resounding return to form for Joel and Ethan, who were again the subjects of early buzz during Oscar season. Their chances boded well, when in early 2008, they took home a shared Golden Globe trophy for Best Screenplay for their dark, disturbing picture. Meanwhile, the Oscar buzz became a reality when "No Country For Old Men" earned eight Academy Award nominations, including nods for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay. The brothers would go on to win for Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Director(s) and, as producers, Best Picture. |
