True Coen

No surprise that I am big film guy. I have loved movies since I was old enough to crawl up and touch the TV screen, speaking in baby-talk, "mmm, long narrative form." (Or something like that.) I had a favorite station coming out of Yorkton, Sask. that must have had a very limited selection of movies - it seemed like there was a Spaghetti western on every other week, or sometimes once a week. I loved Clint a lot - but early on I was much more interested in this Sergio Leone guy. Once Upon a Time in the West (sans Clint) was brilliantly quirky, as was Duck You Sucker starring another childhood hero, James Coburn.

I guess where I am going is that I have always loved directors over actors (and Clint has been shining in that area over the last decade or so) - and the form I love best will probably still be the Western. There is certainly a huge chunk of nostalgia at work here, many Sat. afternoon matinees with Trinity movies, or that other guy I didn't like so much, John Wayne. He was too clean, too good, too classic cowboy. Give me a good smoking and spitting anti-hero anytime. That is except for one movie: True Grit. It was epic, and Wayne playing against the type. (To digress, there is one other: The Searchers - but I only discovered Ford's classic much later in my viewing life.)

Flash forward to now and my favorite directors: The Coen Brothers. By far the most interesting film makers out there. When I first saw Blood Simple I knew this was the birth of something else. I am huge Hitchcock fan, so I noted the homage at work, but guessed there was something else going on. Then movie after movie they blew me away - the laugh out loud Raising Arizona, the dark Miller's Crossing, the even darker Barton Fink... and Fargo, probably the best of them all for sheer movie making. Then Brother Where Art Thou - a musical greek epic! Even the lesser ones like Intolerable Cruelty or the Man Who Wasn't There. The cult of the dude and the Big Lebowski, and the sharp Burn After Reading (way too underrated IMO). And of course, No Country for Old Men - I barely have words, even gushy ones, to describe this brilliance.

Okay, so I am a fan boy. Guilty as charged.

But now, wait for it. The dude is back. The Bros. are back. True Grit is back.

Oh my. I cannot wait.