SHERDOG MOVIE CLUB: Week 134 - The Man Who Wasn't There

[europe1]

NOTE to NON-MEMBERS: Interested in joining the SHERDOG MOVIE CLUB? Shoot me a PM for more info!

Here's a quick list of all movies watched by the SMC. Or if you prefer, here's a more detailed examination.

He smoked all those cigarettes and ended up getting smoked.

Our Director(s)

The Man Who Wasn't There is directed by Joel and Ethen Coen. The brothers write, direct and produce their films as a team.

The two were born and raised in a suburb of Minneapolis, where as a child Joel saved money he made mowing lawns and purchased a Vivitar Super 8 camera. After recruiting a neighborhood friend as their star, they spent many days remaking movies they saw on TV.

Eventually the two separated briefly to attend college, with Joel spending four years in the undergraduate film program at NYU and Ethan earning a degree in philosophy from Princeton.

Their many films include such venerated titles as Fargo, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, No Country for Old Men, The Big Lebowski, Miller's Crossing and Barton Fink. They have been nominated for 13 Academy Awards.

Both brothers currently live in New York.

Our Star
Billy Bob Thorton!

Premise: A laconic, chain-smoking barber blackmails his wife's boss and lover for money to invest in dry cleaning, but his plan goes terribly wrong.

Budget: £20 Million

Box Office: 18.9 Million

Trailer:



Trivia
(Courtesy of the IMDB)


* Joel Coen and Ethan Coen came up with the story while working on The Hudsucker Proxy (1994). While filming the scene in the barbershop, the Coens saw a prop poster of 1940s haircuts and began developing a story about the barber who cut the hair in the poster.

* Billy Bob Thornton jokingly made it look like Ed Crane had an erection in one of the scenes where he's watching Birdy Abundas playing the piano. Only one of the prop guys noticed during production. When the Coen Brothers later found out, they made it clear that Ed would not be aroused in the scene.

* The movie was filmed in colour, then printed in black and white by special processing. However, at least one print was released with the first reel in normal colour due to an error at the lab.

* The name of the German theoretician that Riedenschneider struggles to remember is Werner Heisenberg.

* The title is taken from the William Hughes Mearns poem "Antigonish".

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Members: @europe1 @MusterX @Scott Parker 27 @the muntjac @Cubo de Sangre @sickc0d3r @FrontNakedChoke @AndersonsFoot @Tufts @Yotsuya @jei @LHWBelt @moreorless87 @ArtemV @Bullitt68 @GSPSAKU @HenryFlower @Nailgun @Rimbaud82 @BeardotheWeirdo @Zer @puppybird​

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[puppybird]

Gandolfini was excellent in this. The scene where he invited the barber to cigars was so tense.

 

[sickc0d3r]

I really loved the first 3/4's of the movie. And then it was a whole different movie that was odd and sort of ruined it for me (not entirely, just in a kind of "why?" way). I'll come back to review after I'm done with my monthly alien probe and fluid check.

 

[Bullitt68]

@europe1, I know you hate it every time someone brings this up, but just so you know, I got your notification for the poll thread but I didn't get one for the discussion thread. Then again, it's Wednesday and the thread's stickied, so the club isn't hard to find.

I was busy last week (I also hate Hammer horror) and I'm still busy this week, but I grabbed The Man Who Wasn't There from the library today and I'm planning on watching it and posting about it in here early next week.

 

[Zer]

I've got this on DVD but all my 3000 or so DVD's are boxed up awaiting a garage sale I'll probably have next year (Because dat Canadian winter is gonna drive away all the marks for the next few months). Guess I'll have to rummage through everything and find it. The things I do for this club.

 

[europe1]

This is going to be one of those "I haven't rewatched it, but I'm still going to try and talk about it" reviews.

EDIT: Holy shit that's a long write-up. Sorry, everyone. I just couldn't figure out a more succinct way to talk about this movie I guess.

(look at those pretty visuals! Look at 'em!)

ED: I worked in a barbershop But I never considered myself a barber. I stumbled into it...well, married into it

I think this brilliantly encapsulates the protagonist's psyche. I work at a barbershop, but I'm not a barber, and I entered the profession out of no initiative on my own.

Ed Crane sees the world through a dispassionate gaze. He virtually lives inside his own head. Others consider him almost invisible in the way he hovers in the background. Frank Raffo, his brother-in-law, is born to the business, happily chopping hair and conversing with the guests, with not a thought to his position in the world. Ed is the opposite. He isn't a barber (not that he dislikes it or anything). But what is he then? The central crux of his character is that he wants something -- but mostly doesn't know what he wants.

Because of this, he has no real passion for anything. Even his wives infidelity he meets with a basic "hey, it's a free country". He then decides to join in on blackmailing Big Dave for sleeping with his wife so that he can start his drycleaning business. For the first time in his life, he takes a decision, trying to make something of himself rather than what the world has made him. But even this is a half-hearted attempt is devoid of passion or much interest. Ed isn't mad about dry-cleaning. The important part is that he's trying to change the status-quo of his life.

(Billy Bob is great in this btw. That haggard, no-emotion visage is perfect for communicating the internalization of Crane's psyche)

Look at this exchange between Ed and Raffo:

Ed: This hair, you ever wonder about it? How it keeps on coming. It just keeps growing.

Frank: “Yeah, lucky for us, huh pal?

Ed. “No, I mean it’s growing, it’s part of us. And we cut it off. And we throw it away… I’m gonna take his hair and throw it out in the dirt. I’m gonna mingle it with common house dirt."

Frank “What the hell are you talking about?”

I think this shows that Ed has a very abstract view of life. Cutting hair is just not enough for him. He wants to know "what is the meaning of hair in the first place?" That is the kind of question he wants answered out of life -- which everyone else ignores.

So, because of his blackmail, Big Dan ends up getting killed and his wife is blamed for the murder. Doris hangs herself as a result. I think this is a sorts-of triggering moment for him, when he becomes more active and involved in the world, finding a more powerful engine to create some sort of meaning.

Not knowing what he wants -- he decides to live vicariously through someone else instead. Jailbait ScarJo wants to be an expert piano player. So he sets the goal of his life that she should have that opportunity. But that's just what he thinks. She likes piano but it isn't exactly her passion (her real passion is to be a DIRTY GIRLLL!!!)

Because of this fault of trying to live vicariously, their engagement ends in failure. You can't live life through others (or at least not when you don't really know the nature of their heart).

After the car-crash, Crane is once again brought before the law, believed to have killed the Salesman he was in cahoots with. His attorney musters a brilliant defence that is about to get him acquitted until fate strikes and his brother-in-law crash the session.

Notice some things in these scenes. The Attorney is very focused on painting Ed Crane as "The Barber". He is just a "Barber". The "Barber" could not have committed this killing, since that is not what the Barber does.

Similarly, when it was Doris who was on trial, Ed Crane admits to the murder. The attorney shoots him down since that would be to ludacris. No one would believe him.

Both of these instances revolve around denoting Ed Crane to "the Barber". It's about removing his agency. He is just "a Barber", the very thing he has definitively marked himself as NOT being this whole movie. This is a conflict between The World and Ed Crane. The World sees people as functions (A Barber) it sloths them into said functions and expects them to act accordingly. That's not what Ed Crane wants. As said, what does hair mean?

Anyways, Ed Crane is sentenced to death. Here is his monologue.

ED: I don’t know where I’m being taken. I don’t know what waits for me, beyond the earth and sky. But I’m not afraid to go. Maybe the things I don’t understand will be clearer there, like when a fog blows away. Maybe Doris will be there. And maybe there I can tell her… all those things… they don’t have words for here.

That is easily the most passion-filled sentence Ed has said this entire movie. "all those things… they don’t have words for here.” It marks his disquietness with our mortal coil. In death, he is not a nihilist. He wants to somehow prove and explain his love for Doris, the very thing our earthly restrictions do not allow us to communicate.

His misadventures might not have given him success. But they have given him something to feel about, something to feel passion for.

Notice the close-up of him being shaved right while in the Electric Chair. I think it's a call-back to his wonderments about hair. Just like life -- it's deposed off, thoughtlessly. People cast it away like lives are cast away.

Concerning the UFO-angle. I don't think it's here just to give MusterX fits.

That said, I don't really think the UFO's are here as a representation of actual Aliens. They're more a representation of Ed Crane's questions about existence. Is there a Greater Force out there that controls or guide existence? It could just as easily be swapped-in for God.

He first encounters the idea when Big Dave's widow narrates about his extraterrestrial encounter. Her presumption that his death was their mischevious doing is of course undercut by the fact that we know it was Crane who did the deed. But I think Ed adapts the idea into his own belief-system (in absence of other interesting stimuli).

His world seems chaotic. The twists-and-turns brought on by the law are beyond any individuals control -- crazy circumstances, happenstances and deplorable timings resulting in Ed and Dorise's death. Such a haphazard existence seems counteractive to someone who wants to find meaning beyond his socially prescribed role (A Barber). As if the Cosmos itself is punishing him.

In that previously mentioned quote, he does seem at least aknowlage the possibility of a life after death. This is a rather strong stance from such an otherwise dispassionate man, a show that he has at least been allowed to believe in something. I think the UFO-vision was more of a confirmation about his new belief-system... that there is a Greater Force out there which controls existence -- that there is a purpose to things and an answer to things like the cutting of hair.

 

[HenryFlower]

the Coens have always existed in the realm of absurdist fiction, but I remember this one in particular being full of parallels to The Stranger (the smoking, sun, murder, execution, Crane’s indifference, etc). will need to find my copy that is also in a box somewhere & rewatch it first things first though. will be the sixth Coens Bros movie I watched in the past week because I did a bit of a revisitation binge after watching The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

 

[Tufts]

Love Coen Bros and love Billy Bob. I find him to be strangely hot and I have no idea why. But hey, so did Angelina, so no need to splain myself!

Not sure when I'll get around to watching this. I'm on the road working and searching for chicken fried steak but will do my best. One of the few Coen's I have not seen.

 

[Zer]

Love Coen Bros and love Billy Bob. I find him to be strangely hot and I have no idea why. But hey, so did Angelina, so no need to splain myself!

I have a little mancrush on Billy Bob too, although I think I already mentioned that I got a thing for Southern accents. He has a natural bad boy swagger going on too. I don't know if it's related to the accent and he just comes off as that Uncle that lets you watch pron with him or some shit

 

[MusterX]

What kind of man is Ed Crane? He stays with his wife when he knows she's cheating on him but maybe that's not a stretch since he married her, at her behest, after only knowing her for two weeks. Big Dave Brewster, played by James Gandolfini and Dorris Crane are both feeding Ed stories about how Doris is going to be getting a big promotion because Dave is getting a big promotion and Dave is calling Ed into his office for personal meetings about the bribe note, which Ed sent. All the while, Ed knows their secret, but he never tells.

Even Big Dave, upon discovering the bribery plot, asks Ed, "What kind of man are you?," because Ed doesn't confront Dave, he doesn't even confront his wife. That's what I'm wondering, what kind of man is Ed? He's described as laconic, a man of few words, but that provides us few answers concerning Ed's personality, not more. Even as Dave is beating him for the bribery note, Ed doesn't fight back. It is only when Dave begins choking Ed that he finally exercises self defense and stabs Dave in the neck, ironically, with a knife he "took off a dead jap" in the war. This movie does take place in 1949 after all.

Ed's bingo loving wife Doris is "pinched" for the embezzlement scheme and the resulting murder of Big Dave so now Ed's bribery to get the money to invest in a dry cleaning business has resulted in the death of the man who was sleeping with his wife as well as his wife being put in jail. My first thought was Ed is either the luckiest revenge guy of all time, because he didn't plan revenge and got it anyway, or he is a genius. I'm still left wondering, what kind of man Ed Crane really is.

Ed consults a local lawyer, Walter Abundas, the father of Rachel, who tells him to use a county defender to defend his wife because nobody in the area has any expertise with a murder trial. Does Ed feel bad for his wife Doris? His demeanor doesn't show any difference, he is Ted Bundy calm, whether cutting a head of hair or encountering police two weeks after he committed a homicide, yet, even after all that happened, when his cheating wife who was in jail came to visitation, Ed still stands when she enters the room. The viewer might argue that its the time period, men stood when women entered a room, but not for a cheating wife.And still, I can't quite understand what I'm looking at when I look at Ed Crane.

Maybe Ed is a man of principle, maybe he doesn't particularly feel bad for his cheating wife but he feels bad in the way that she was never intended to get in trouble, Ed was not seeking revenge, he was trying to bribe her lover for money for a dry cleaning business, and yet, he doesn't confess to killing Big Dave in self defense, in fact what does Ed do? He doubles down and he gets his brother-in-law to put the barber shop up as collateral on a loan to pay the best lawyer in Sacramento, Freddy Riedenschneider played by Tony Shalhoub, to defend his cheating wife Doris.

Enter Ann Nirdlinger Brewster, the wife of Big Dave. She stops by in a black dress with a veil on, it seems like its late at night, the shadows play off of the trees lining the street behind her as the wind blows. She tells Ed she knows Doris didn't kill Dave because they had gone camping the year before and saw some lights in the sky, U.F.O.s, and they reported it to the government. Not just saw U.F.O.'s but she saw space creatures that led Big Dave into the spacecraft. She tells Ed that this is a government conspiracy and coverup.

Ann tells Ed that "knowledge is a curse" and that Dave never touched her again. She hopes that disclosure will finally happen and she walks off creepily down the walkway into the night. Why would the Coen brothers put this seemingly out of place scene in the film? For one thing the film takes place in 1949, the Roswell incident took place just two years prior in 1947. To Ann, knowledge being a curse was her knowing the truth about alien abduction and government coverup, to Ed Crane, knowledge is a curse was the knowledge of what he had done. Ann needed a way out of her life. She needed a way out to explain why her husband Big Dave wouldn't sleep with her anymore and the alien abduction was more palatable than an affair.

When Ed and Doris meet with their lawyer, he explains that he hates their defense, it stinks, because Doris' alibi relies upon the testimony of her husband Ed. Perhaps its his guilt over Doris being charged with murder, or perhaps his knowledge of his part in the whole sordid affair, finally is more than he can take so he blurts out the line. "I killed him," to which he then adds, "he and Doris were having an affair."
Doris just stares at him with a look on her face like she can't believe it.

She can't believe it because he knew about the affair, or she can't believe it because she's in jail for a murder she didn't commit, or she can't believe it because Ed killed Big Dave, we don't know. The scene ends with her staring at ed with a look that only Frances McDormand can give. What does this say about the family unit of the time period, if anything? Even after Doris cheated on him, and even after Ed bribed her lover and ultimately killed him, and even after Doris found out Ed left her in jail for a murder she didn't commit, there is this feeling of understanding between the two as Ed sets out to find his Dry Cleaning partner, Creighton Tolliver, to help with the case. Creighton has skipped town and didn't pay any bills before he left but in reality Big Dave beat him to death and drove his body into the river.

Ed has a strange fascination with Rachel "Birdy" and her music. She's just a high school girl and for whatever reason Ed "feels alright" when he's around her. He hatches a plan to become her agent as he narrates, even laments, that everyone is just looking for a way out. Big Dave lied about his service in the war because he didn't like who he was, Doris needed a way out of the death penalty, and in some way of her marriage which is why she was cheating on Ed, Ed needed a way out of his life which seemed unfulfilling in every way. I honestly thought he was sexually attracted to Rachel who was 16 years old. You can imagine my omg face when they were in the car and she tried to give him head. Ed Crane resisted her and ended up crashing the car and then we see the hub cap rolling on the ground looking like a U.F.O.

In some way, Rachel was Ed's, "I gotta find a way out moment." Its the reason why the hub cap rolling down the road looked like a U.F.O. Rachel was his U.F.O. that made life more palatable but then he realized it was just an illusion. He decides to stay with Doris until the trial was over and then to get a new start in life. He was going to get out of his marriage, and really his life. Freddy Riedenscheider comes up with an elegant defense for Doris, the Uncertainty Principle, the idea that looking at something changes it. He says the more you look at the case, the less you really know, and that is reasonable doubt. He says its scientific because Heisenberg proved it with mathematics. Things are really looking up at this point, Doris can get out of prison and Ed can start a new life, they both can.

None of it mattered in the end, as Doris hanged herself on the first day of the trial using the belt of her dress that Ed had brought her to wear to court. What appears to be a faithful husband, who has been victimized by his cheating wife and her lover, has now turned into something entirely else. Ed was responsible for the bribery scheme to steal ten thousand dollars, Ed was responsible for death of Big Dave, albeit self defense, Ed was responsible for the barber shop being mortgaged to the bank, and now, Ed was responsible for the suicide of his wife.

Revenge is never good, everyone's life was permanently altered. Frank became an alcoholic and didn't even show up at the barber shop anymore. Finally we find out that Doris was pregnant with Big Dave's baby and she committed suicide. At the end, on death row, Ed sees a U.F.O. during a dream. The U.F.O. represents life, each individuals life, and the extent to which we are desperate for some answer, or escape, or some meaning to the things that went wrong. Ann saw the U.F.O. as a reason why her husband didn't sleep with her anymore. Ed saw the U.F.O. as a representation of his life that he described as a maze of twists and turns that form the shape of a person's life. And one more thing, during his execution, the guard shaves Ed's leg, just as Ed had shaved his wife Doris' legs.

 

[Zer]

I haven't rewatched this yet but my main memory of the film was Tony Shaloub absolutely stealing the show. He's probably one of the single most memorable performances from a Coen bros film for me, and that's saying something. "The more you look the less you know"

 

[Tufts]

I have a little mancrush on Billy Bob too, although I think I already mentioned that I got a thing for Southern accents. He has a natural bad boy swagger going on too. I don't know if it's related to the accent and he just comes off as that Uncle that lets you watch pron with him or some shit

You did mention your accent fetish... we had a wee convo about it that led to me talking about chicken fried steak

I think it's all the attitude. It's like he decided he was hot so we are all like, ok you are He is not tall, dark, handsome, six packed or long haired, my usual go to. He is a bad boy though, and that always works for me. And he has an awesome shit eating grin. But I don't really want to see him with his shirt off.

Now I'm confused on why I find certain men attractive.

This movie club is giving me an identity crisis

 

[MusterX]

(look at those pretty visuals! Look at 'em!)

The shadows in this film were fantastic. I lost count how many times bars appeared on screen, like prison bars. Even when it appears inadvertent those bars show up.

Not just the bars but overall the shadow work in this film is A+

And I just want to say, that the U.F.O. scene, is otherworldly in terms of the audio, the sound of a light breeze in the leaves of the trees, the ominous score, the shadow play on the street behind them but also the shadow of Ann's hat on the wall next to Ed's head. It seems like a scene you could see in a film school somewhere. Everything is done right.

 

[MusterX]

I haven't rewatched this yet but my main memory of the film was Tony Shaloub absolutely stealing the show. He's probably one of the single most memorable performances from a Coen bros film for me, and that's saying something. "The more you look the less you know"

Tony Shalhoub seems born to play a quick witted attorney. His defense for Doris was elegant, using Heisenberg's uncertainty principle to explain to the jury that simply by observing something, you change it, and you can never really know what happened, and that is enough for reasonable doubt. Ed tried to confess to him twice, one on film and once in narration, but Freddy Riedenschneider didn't like it because it wasn't believable. He plays a classic driven attorney who almost doesn't care what the truth is, he cares about litigation. When Doris committed suicide he seemed unphased that Doris was dead, he was just disappointed he didn't get to present his case.

 

[Yotsuya]

I love this movie, but I've seen it twice already and that's enough for me. Instead I think I'll watch another Coen neo-noir Blood Simple, which I have never seen. I'm not always a huge fan of director's cuts, but in this case it sounds like the version to see and not example of Lucasian whitewashing.

 

[MusterX]

I love this movie, but I've seen it twice already and that's enough for me. Instead I think I'll watch another Coen neo-noir Blood Simple, which I have never seen. I'm not always a huge fan of director's cuts, but in this case it sounds like the version to see and not example of Lucasian whitewashing.

Blood Simple is a good choice, the club watched it way back in Week 15 if you want to check out the thread after you watch it.

 

[Zer]

Bringing up Blood Simple just reminded me fat people get a fair shake in Coen bros films. They love them some fatties. M. Emmet Walsh in Blood Simple ... John Goodman in Barton Fink/Big Lebowski ... Jon Polito in this and Miller's Crossing ... Gandolfini and Badalucco were also great in TMWWT ... as a former fattie myself I quite like how big a place they have in Coen bros films

 

[KOQ24]

Bringing up Blood Simple just reminded me fat people get a fair shake in Coen bros films. They love them some fatties. M. Emmet Walsh in Blood Simple ... John Goodman in Barton Fink/Big Lebowski ... Jon Polito in this and Miller's Crossing ... Gandolfini and Badalucco were also great in TMWWT ... as a former fattie myself I quite like how big a place they have in Coen bros films

And they arguably all steal the show in their respective Films.
The opening scene with Polito & Finney in Miller's Crossing is fucking amazing.

 

[Nailgun]

I’ve avoided this film for many years. For me, the Coen bros. are very hit or miss. When I caught a trailer that had the spaceship scene I thought fuck that, and avoided like the plague ever since.

However, thanks to the guys who voted for this, I will gladly admit avoiding this was a huge mistake because TMWWT is a fantastic film.

There’s no question, the Coen brothers know how to tell a story. With the right casting to deliver the dialogue with aplomb, plus interesting subject matter, you can be really sucked in by their art. Then there was the aesthetics, the lighting was magnificent and the sharpness of the black and white was stunning. I could spend hours just looking at stills of this flick.

The casting was decent. Gandolfini pretty much played Tony Soprano without it being too much of an issue. Scarlett, who I absolutely adore, was kind of fittingly annoying with a monotone voice for this role. McDormand looked actually quite fit in this, unfortunately she has this terrible habit of looking like she’s reading an autocue whenever she’s acting like shes deep in thought.

The highlight though, was none of the above. It was the performance of Billy Bob. He encapsulates the strong silent type (another Sopranos ref.). Billy Bob is a bad mother fucker. He was almost emotionless throughout, but somehow manages to win your affection and has you rooting for him. I guess personally, I identify with him continuously being talked at, rather than talked to. He was a perfect choice for the role, very possibly my fave performance of this very fine actor.

I’m so glad I watched this film, thank you to the movie club for the film and also for the reviews earlier in the thread.

 

[Zer]

I rewatched the film and I enjoyed it as much as I did the previous times. It's kind of a difficult to review because I wouldn't say it's an all-time great or even a Top 5 Coen Bros film, but I can't really put my finger on any major flaws it has. Which also makes for a lame review because you can't really rip the shit out of it. I suppose it doesn't hit the heights of other Coen bros films because it's so understated and modest, but then that's a quality all of its own.

It reminds me a lot of Takeshi Kitano films where silence is a big component and you're often trying to figure out a stoney, expressionless character while he stands around quietly. No Country was like that too. I wonder if the Coen bros have ever fucked with Kitano films. Billy Bob is perfect in this because even though on paper he's in a boring role, visually he has so much character and a huge presence. And while we don't see obvious charisma he's always threatening to take a turn just because he looks like a sleazy dude. Like I said before where he comes off like a creepy porno uncle. It's a risk to watch porno with your creepy uncle but you're probably going to do it anyway because you're kind of excited to find what kind of porno he's into. You want to figure the guy out and see how creepy he can get. Anyway I'm not saying Ed Crane is creepy or ultimately a bad person. There could be multiple readings of what he is and what he represents.