Customer Reviews

The Man Who Wasn't There

5 star:		(41)
4 star:		(30)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

Well, leave it to the Coen brothers to turn a story about a barber who wants to become a dry cleaner into a little masterpiece. Everything about this film is superb. You could watch it frame by frame and never find a glitch. The cinematography is brilliant, and the film is in black and white. It could not be in colour, which would distract from its focus. The acting, the casting, are impeccable. Billy Bob is so absolutely the man who wasn't there that I can't remember his name in the film. This film is the same kind of tragedy as Fargo: you can see exactly what the tragic flaw is, exactly where everything goes wrong, and everything follows absolutely. It is quite beautiful in this logical progression of results to actions. But the focus is on our anti-hero, Billy Bob, who is one of the best developed and most believable characters I have ever seen on screen. Why he didn't get one of those heavy gold statues for this performance is beyond me.
The DVD has a great commentary with the Coen brothers and Billy Bob, quite a funny and interesting commentary. One of the better ones. There are also interviews with the various actors in the film and with the infamous brothers themselves. All in all, I could not recommend any film more highly than this one. There is nothing that simple here. This is a film about life, about fear, about fears of inadequacy, about not being recognized, about everything good you ever tried to do turning to [bad stuff].It is the tragedy of a failure who simply could not be anything other than what he was, and it is utterly brilliant.

The Man Who Wasn't There is the Coen brothers slow-moving film-noirish movie about a chain-smoking barber named Ed Crane (Billy Bob) who has an opportunity to get into the dry-cleaning business, and blackmail his wife's (Francis McDormand) lover (James Gandolfini) for the $10,000 needed to get into the deal with a dry-cleaner (Jon Polito). As with most Coen brothers movies, the simple plot gets involved in subleties that may help or hinder it.

Billy Bob plays Ed with a sedate, reserved manner. Scarlet Johansson has a supporting role as a piano-playing young girl who Ed wants to help get lessons. She turns out to be only a mediocre player, and has no interest in a musical careeer. She does show her gratitude toward Ed in an oral, yet non-verbal way, however.

There are no English subtitles which could have come in handy during the giggly commentary by the Coen's and Billy Bob. The "making of" documentary was a bit below average. The conversation with cinematographer Roger Deakins could have benefitted from his voice-over on top of clips as examples, rather than having to try to remember scenes he is talking about. A few deleted scenes, photo gallery, filmographies and a trailer round out the reasonably-priced DVD.

Rated "R" for some neck-stabbing violence.

Not for everyone, but fans of the Coen brothers, Billy Bob, or Scarlett Johansson should like it. Perhaps generous with 4 stars, I'm giving the movie and extras the benefit of the doubt.

"The Man Who Wasn't There" is a great film release from 2001, starring Billy Bob Thorton, Frances McDormand, Scarlett Johansson, and James Gandolfini. The Joel and Ethan Coen, the Oscar winning writers of "Fargo", prove that their creative minds express great and original entertainment. This gloomy themed movie keeps audiences interested in every scene, besides the black and white scenery. The plot of a barber who begins illegal dry cleaning, then becomes blackmailed, is brilliant. Its combination of mystery, drama, and suspense blends perfectly. The special effects, namely the UFO, add more interesting entertainment value. As the series of events unfold, the timely theme builds, leading to a surprising conclusion. Such movie quality offers a great unforgettable film experience. Billy Bob Thorton beautifully acts his role of Ed Gayne, the barber. Gayne's hard times are expressed greatly, which proves more difficult to accomplish because he doesn't speak often. His narration throughout the film offers another sense of mystery and gloomy effect. Frances McDormand's role as Gayne's wife is performed at her top throughout the film, expressing every emotion accurately. Scarlett Johansson proves that she is one of the few child stars with actual acting talent (she was 16). All other actors also perform their roles greatly. "The Man Who Wasn't There" is a great film that will keep audiences entertained for a long time. There is no other film like it.

This is a movie that sneaks up on you as you watch it. Like all Coen brothers movies, on the surface it is a story about a relatively small lie that mushrooms out of control, but this film goes deeper than the simple morality tales many Coen brothers films are at heart. This is the study of a man who has become detached from society, and who becomes more detached as the film goes on. Its pace is deliberate and the film intentionally lacks any sort of dynamic range in tone, but stick with it - it's beautiful to look at (this is real cinematography - the play of light and composition on display in every frame), and if you can hold your attention to the end you will likely find the film a profound experience. Sad in a thoughtful way, the film does not manipulate you into tears and is at the end life affirming in an intangible way that's difficult to explain. Highly reccomended!

The Coen brothers have the reputation of being excellent, if not a bit quirky, filmmakers. "The Man Who Wasn't There" continues with this reputation. This film, at all once, parodies and worships the film noir genre. The main character, Ed Crane, is a barber in a small Californian town where everyone lives under the guise of perfection: A sort of Western Levittown.

Crane (played by Billy Bob Thorton) speaks slowly, without varied emotion, while narrarating this film. The premise of the plot is Crane's attempt to "go in on" a dry cleaning business with a rather seedy passing-through businessman. When the business man is found dead, Crane is the primary suspect. Crane's wife is having an affair with her boss. When Crane eventually confronts him, he (Crane) also winds up killing him. In the typical noir style, there is a vague detachment of the protagonist from his surroundings: Regardless of what events may come forth, Crane's voice and disposition do not change the slightest.

Probably the biggest downfall of "The Man Who Wasn't There" is the ending. It almost seems that the Coen brothers aren't satisfied with having created a strong film, and therefore they felt obligated to tinker with the ending. Unfortunately, this does not work. The ending leaves something to be desired: It does a poor job of ending the film, and mismatches the previous parts of the film (ie, like pairing plaid shirts and striped pants). The ending itself wasn't bad, it was simply that it deviated so much from the film's style that it essentially wrecked the ending of the film.

While I do not believe this to be one of the Coen brother's strongest films, it must still be viewed. It is a relatively large deviation from many of their movies (that is, the typical dark humor). There must be artistic kudos given to them, as they have again demonstrated that they may adroitly expand into other "genres" of film, without ever entirely abandoning their style.

I thought O BROTHER WHERE ART THOU? was the low point of the Coen Brothers' otherwise remarkably fine body of work, but THE MAN WHO WASN'T THERE proves me wrong. This is like a film-school exercise, a demonstration of cleverness in reconstructing a post-war noir and pushing all the elements to extremes. It's so self-consciously stylish and tongue-in-cheek as to utterly defy suspension of disbelief, but seems to take itself too seriously to succeed as a spoof. It's somewhat amusing intellectually, on the meta- level, to see the Coens play with the genre's conventions, but hardly funny enough to justify the 2 hour running time. The gag wears thin long before it's over.

Many of the individual scenes and shots brilliantly reference the noir style, with striking high-contrast blacks and whites dominating the frame. And several performances are sufficiently entertaining to repay the time spent watching--especially Tony Shaloub, outstanding as always, playing the fast-talking defense attorney from Sacramento. Richard Jenkins's slightly saturated home-town lawyer is a small treasure. Adam Alexi-Malle makes a splendidly self-impressed piano teacher, and Frances McDormand has several strong scenes, most notably when congratulating the bride at a wedding in Modesto. And Billy Bob Thornton does an admirable job of playing an expressionless one-note character (maybe he should have gotten an Oscar, like Dustin Hoffman got for RAINMAN), but--like the story itself--that wears thin awfully fast.

Stylish? Yes. Skilful? You bet. But in the end far from satisfying--as one ought expect from a movie about a gimmicky idea instead of a story about characters we can care about. Sure, the Coens' work is always idea based--RAISING ARIZONA, FARGO, THE BIG LEBOWSKI, for instance--but their success in turning an idea into interesting entertainment has always depended on characters the viewer can identify with. Otherwise, no matter how clever the movie, the bottom line will always be "Who cares?"

A friend of mine who is a serious fan of the Coen brothers loaned me this film recently and I loved it. It really goes out to give you that 1940's film noir feel and it succeeds masterfully. The Coens have shown us their range before, giving us a film like Raising Arizona, one of the funniest movies of all time, and then a movie like Fargo, which had some in your face shock moments you will never forget.

Now we have Ed Crane (Billy Bob Thornton), a barber who puts more cigarattes into his mouth in the film than speaks words out of it. He is the second chair in the barbershop and he "just keeps cutting the hair". One day, he has a customer who has the newest phenomenon for America, dry cleaning. He has done all the research, just needs some start up capital to get going. Thornton knows just how to get the money, and decides to go in with the stranger.

This sets off the events seen during the rest of the film, including blackmail, murder, courtroom trials, and a strange fascination with the musical talents of a young teenage girl. Through it all, Thornton seems more like an observer of life than willing to take control of things. His wife, (Francis McDormand) is a burn out who doesn't really love him and his friend, Dave (James Gandolfini) may not be as good a friend as he thinks. Crane doesn't seem to give a rip regardless of the situation. It's one of the most interesting characters we've seen recently. Thornton was a perfect choice for the role.

In the end, this is not a happy movie. Not by any means. But unlike depressing films like Leaving Las Vegas, we are not dragged down into the abyss. Maybe that's because we have learned to look at life like Ed Crane, just keep plodding along.

I normally wind up with mixed emotions when it comes to films from the Coen brothers but I think they've got all their tricks in line with this one.

Those in the know with classic literature will easily notice that the "Man who wasn't..." is based on Camus' famed book "The stranger". The equations between this great book and the film are well balanced: the book is provoking and so is the film.

The plot is about a barber working in a small town. His life has all the tell-tale signs of a "nobody-special" man like him: his job isnt taking him anywhere, his marriage is a flat and boring non-relationship, his wife is double-timing him with one of his "friends", and he himself, well he doesn't seem to bother much about all that, or actually he doesn't seem to care about anything.

Life drags dully on, until the arrival of someone who tells the barber of his plan to hit the market with a new revolutionary business plan: dry cleaning. The whole scheme sounds attractive and has money-making potential written all over it but the missing element is the capital. The barber's mind goes on an interesting vortex of planning. He blackmails his well-off friend who has the affair with his wife for a nice bulky sum. That seems to work, the money is given, and then given on to the dry-cleaning guy and then, well, perhaps predictably, the wheels of the wagon start coming off in disturbing and untimely manner.

Without fully realising how it all happened, the barber winds up in a plot which involves a murder he commited, his wife in jail accused for it, the dry-cleaning guy gone with the dough, him looking for a good lawyer to save his wrongly accused wife, and in the midst of it all, he still seems to deal with this nicely unraveling disaster very apathetically.

But his apathy isnt rewarded much as thing keep becoming more intricate and more threatening.

Just as it had been with his wife, he tries to start a relationship in extremely platonic terms with another young woman, but alas, that comes to spell his ultimate doom. No need to reveal the cool bringing-it-all together ending of the film especially for those that havent seen the film.

But besides a great story line, "The man who wasn't..." is blessed with other assets too, mainly the stellar performances from Thortnton himself who gives apathy a new look, and F.Mcdormand who (as usual) is exemplary in her role. But also the usually underrated J.Gandolfini is great as are all the second characters as well.
The Coen bros. do wonders with the camera, the lights and the reenacting of the 30s atmosphere making this an unheralded masterpiece.
While the film is actually a take on the philosophy about life, or to be more specific, an approach that reads "who cares really, let it all unwind and see what happens", it will go down easily with mostly anybody. The characters portrayed here are as real-life as they come and the depiction of the basic faults (?) of human nature is given to perfection.

Greed, scheming, extreme selfishness, hypocrisy, and all the things that are products of the above come in display. And in the end as the "hero" from the barber shop sees it all collapse in smouldering flames he thinks: "maybe all this means that I'm going to a better place. Who's to say"..And that's the thing really: who's to say?

Great film in all possible respects and quite probably the best made by the Coens so far.

coens are truly remarkable filmmakers. i've enjoyed the man who wasn't there more than a few times, even in the theater. i would prolly agree with other reviewers who identify it as a sort of half-homage/half-parody of noir. it definitely has elements of camus' the stranger in it, cold war paranoia, etc.

but there is something i've missed every time watching it, probably due to thorton's entrancing performance as the alien barber. his masculinity appears always intact, completely independent from the world that is impenetrable by the normal convictions of morality and ethics of the time. he is in many ways a stranger. but beyond all this, there is something very fascinating about the man who wasn't there that was only just recently brought to my attention. scoping for reviews online of this coen film, i stumbled across a series of essays detailing ed crane's repressed HOMOSEXUALITY. it seems actually rather elementary now that i think about it, but the story is just so ... mesmerizing, you miss the underlying arrows towards the answer, or an interpretable one.

reasoning examples:

- the title of the film
- the protagonist's name, ed crane (feminine bird)
- he uses, to quote riedenschneider, a dame's weapon (the cigar cutter)
- his lack of interest for heterosexual sex; strictly platonic relationships.

for fans of the film i completely recommend visiting the essay at http://www.ejumpcut.org/currentissue/brook.pansies/ for further information. completely interesting essay about noir, homosexuality, and this beautifully shot, coen piece about estrangement.

Ostensibly like Albert Camus' book called "The Stranger", this movie is basically an unfurling retrospective of an ordinary barber's life. There really is no other way to describe this quaint offering from the Coens.

Depending on whom you ask, the attempted film noir could be about several of the many themes that it broaches: simplicity of small town life, fidelity, friendship, entrepreunerism (the barber has a perpetual but unfulfilled wish to get into the dry cleaning business that was apparently the hot thing back then in 1930s), about the "what does around comes around" (the barber pays for what he has done), pursuing your dreams (encouraging a young girl to take up piano as a career). At one point, I also felt the Coens would go down the "Lolita" road, and hinted at it with a driving scene, but an accident pretty much killed that possibility. Above all, in a somewhat bizarre twist, we also have UFOs thrown in.

If all this is too heavy for you, there's a hint of humor in between these deep crevices. The barber's lawyer is almost a caricature of the legal profession.

But ultimately, the movie is a scattershot rambling of a man about his life gone awry. Somewhat like an "About Schmidt", just less hopeless and more definitive in its conclusion. Bob Thornton is as convincing as he was in "Monsters Ball". Come to think of it, the three movies have a similar relaxed pacing.

On a positive note, the movie has an atmospheric story-telling feel to it. If, like with poetry, you don't necessarily NEED a movie to be about something SPECIFIC, this movie may be well worth a ride.

Overall, an enjoyable movie but perhaps not for every pallete.