9 Reviews from the Land of JBU Cinema: "O Brother, Where Art Thou"

Written for various prompts in and out of my Cinema classes at John Brown this past semester, these reviews/analyses seemed to warrant inclusion here.

“O Brother, Where Art Thou,” like some of the other Coen Bros. films that I’ve seen in the past, is so steadfast in its own brand of quirkiness that much of its humor was lost on me.  I understood the gags, and chuckled at a few here and there (“We’re in a tight spot!”), but never really connected with them.

I suppose, then, that my own personal brand of humor is too narrow, but it does not prevent me from saying that of the Coen films I have experienced, this is one of the best looking. I imagine Roger Deakins collaborates with the Coens so much because his visual style is as earnest and straight-faced as their deadpan wit. His work is always just what it needs to be – clear, focused, and correctly exposed. It is never flashy, so it is sometimes difficult for me (still largely uninitiated in the technical world of filmmaking) to recognize his shots as more than adequate, although they are, in reality, quietly flawless.

“O Brother, Where Art Thou” certainly marks the heaviest use of color correction I’ve ever encountered from Deakins. This is, for all intents and purposes, a monochrome film - black and white isn’t really the correct term, because the final aesthetic is more reminiscent of sepia-tone photographs from the Depression-era. The color effect, I imagine, was completed almost entirely in post, though Deakins‘ eye for beauty in bleakness must have provided a natural in-camera starting point. Is it effective? I can’t imagine this film working without it, so I would say so. The color correction not only perfectly represents the dustiness and heat of the setting and era, but also adds a crucial element of the surreal to the story as a whole, providing at least some grounding and stability for the Coens’ bizarre narrative. The film would be unwatchable if the sheer strangeness of its story were not acknowledged by Deakins’ use of color.