A Serious Man
Review
by Anthony Morris
|
|
|
A Serious Man
|
It's 1967, and Jewish uni professor Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg) has the weight of the world bearing down on his shoulders.
His
wife is set to leave him for the most annoying man alive, a series of
anonymous letters are threatening his chances for tenure, one of his
students seems to be trying to bribe him, his two kids treat him like a
combination cash machine and TV repairman, his brother has moved in and
keeps babbling about some kind of mathematical gambling scheme he's
figured out, and whenever Gopnik turns to his rabbi for help all he
gets are long-winded and nonsensical stories.
Maybe if he
could figure out some meaning behind all this he would be able to
endure; sadly for him, any kind of higher meaning (or even narrative
closure) is currently in short supply.
The Coen Brothers (Burn After Reading, Fargo, No Country for Old Men) are back doing what they do best with this deeply quirky, murkily personal, often hilarious and rarely obvious film.
A
prologue set in the 19th century sets the tone, shaped like a folktale
but without any clear meaning or relevance to the story that follows.
The stress placed on Gopnik's Jewishness feels like it might provide
some clue, but the various rabbis he visits prove to be useless.
Perhaps
the looming counter-culture might provide a way out of his troubles,
but that’s a dead-end too. And if you're expecting any kind of tidy
conclusion, you're in the same boat as Gopnik. Which is probably the
Coens' point.
For once in the Coens' recent comedies not
everyone here is an idiot, but not being an idiot doesn't help Gopnik
much, as his world continues to spiral out of control to the
disinterest of all. His increasingly desperate search for answers
– or even just an explanation as to why all this is happening to him –
is clearly futile, but what else can he (or any of us) do?
There's
a lot to think about and laugh at here, and while for some the lack of
easy answers could be frustrating if you're willing to just go along
with the ride, you're bound to enjoy what is one of the Coens' best
films in recent years.
3 out
of 5
A Serious Man
Australian release: 12th November,
2009
Official
Site: A Serious Man
Cast: Simon Helberg, Adam Arkin, Richard Kind, Michael Stuhlbarg, George Wyner
Director: Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
|
