A Serious Man

By
joseph
Published: October 27, 2009Posted in: Cinerama, Still in theaterTags: , , ,
A Serious Man
Score:9
Pros:The film is relentless and unapologetic in revealing a particularly Jewish worldview.
Cons:Don't expect to see a crowd-pleaser.

And as I looked at the blanket mountain before me I saw two eyes staring at me. Only the eyes were dark, black, blank… looking at me from underneath a hood, a black hood with a sharp tall peak, like a ku-klux-klansman. They kept staring at me, dark blank eyes, and there was nothing I could do about it. I was truly terrified. I thought, it’s God, but God isn’t supposed to look like that. — Bukowski, Ham On Rye

Behold, I will corrupt your seed, and spread dung upon your faces. – Malachi Ch. 2 Vs. 3

While many people may be anticipating the forthcoming comedy The Men Who Stare at Goats, thinking it’s the new Coen Brothers film, the real movie that was just released by the makers of Fargo, The Big Lebowski, et al, shows that the Coens have no intention of revisiting their earlier films, or ceasing to surprise and confound moviegoers. A Serious Man is a story of mid-life anxieties, cultural and personal antipathies, and the incompatibility between ancient traditions and modern moral dillemas. And it is probably one of the most unsettling films the Coen Bros. have made. It has been called a “black comedy,” I suppose because “dark” just doesn’t suffice. It has also been called their greatest film to date, which is no small praise for a filmmaking team that always seems to be as fresh and original as they are fastidious in their craft.

The film centers around the disheveling life of Larry Gopnik, a man facing a failing marriage, ambivalent children, a troubled couch surfing brother, car-accidents, lawyer fees, and countless other inauspicious people or forces that almost seem to be relentlessly plucking away at his already vulnerable state of mind, not to mention his finances. Everything that he believed about life seems to have been false, and the moral crisis he is going through mirrors that of the Biblical Job, or of the writer of Ecclesiastes when he said “all is vanity, and vexation of spirit.” In the film, the Coens use the music of Jefferson Airplane in the place of the poetry of Job or the Preacher. The beginning of the movie takes us through the midst of a black void within which all we can hear is the voice of Grace Slick singing, “when the truth is found to be lies, and all of the Joy within you dies…” and the rest of the film is Larry’s search for an answer, some sort of connection to a cultural heilsgeschichte that is never found. He seeks counsil from Rabbis and even his lawyer, who seem to be just as clueless as he is. Finally, he is haunted by a menacing former rival in a dream who tells him to talk to the elder Rabbi Marshak, but the Rabbi refuses him, he no longer speaks to anyone. An old man in an ancient looking room of books, skulls and other artifacts, Marshak is the closest thing to God that we see in this film, and his silence is God’s silence. Yet while the god in this film doesn’t seem to speak or give any answers, there is a supernatual or mythic quality to the cruel events that unfold in the story. In the end it seems like we receive an answer from God, but it is not a redemptive God, it is the malevolent God we often find in the so-called “Old Testament;” it is the God of Job, the voice from the whirlwind.

About the Author

joseph Joseph is an unemployed writer who spends most of his time popping pills, drinking and obsessively checking for new facebook comments. His favorite kind of movies are the ones with quiet explosions and small-breasted women.