Rushfield Babylon
Month
I’ve seen a lot of lists out there ranking the Coen Brothers films and have been struck by the fact that they are all wrong. Start with the fact that their two Oscar winners - Fargo and No Country - are at or near the top of most lists - the list apparently being written just to be one more voice confirming the conventional wisdom consensus. Those two are, of course, their two worst films. The Coen Brothers are great dark comic filmmakers. But when they go into dark without the comedy and just get portentous and meaningful, the great void at the heart of their nihilistic vision swallows the story leaving it as nothing but posturing sophmoric nastiness. Also, we should all see now with a couple years behind us, what is indisputably their finest film and one of the best films of the decade.
Here then is the correct ranking. You are welcome to disagree so long as you understand your disagreement only makes clear your own foolishness. If you can’t accept that, then you are not allowed to disagree.
1. A Serious Man
2. O Brother Where Art Thou
3. The Big Lebowski
4. Raising Arizona
5. The Hudsucker Proxy
6. True Grit
7. Barton Fink
8. Miller’s Crossing
9. Blood Simple
10. The Lady Killers
11. Intolerable Cruelty
12. Burn After Reading
13. Fargo
14. No Country for Old Men
Unseen (By me or anybody): The Man Who Wasnt There
Why did no one will me this existed?
Probably the greatest version of the greatest song of the past 200 years performed by the greatest singer.
People need to talk about this more.
On Getting “Exposed” Green Lit:
James Toback: Well, including David Begelman who was running MGM/UA. He’d already turned it down. But I found myself with $2 million cash, which I won in Vegas. By the way, lest the IRS be listening, my net figure with Vegas is about minus $50 million, so please don’t tell me I made money that way, as anyone in Vegas will vouch. But in any event, I had that $2 million. This is 1981. I thought, ‘Christ, I’m not gonna hang around here any more pounding on doors chasing money. I’ll just bribe Begelman and get the movie done.’ So I walked into his office and with two suitcases –
Alec Baldwin: Filled with your Vegas winnings.
James Toback: Yeah, and let’s say without filling in the details, it got a green light.
Alec Baldwin: How much money did they give you to make the movie?
James Toback: Five hundred thousand, so I was at minus a million five. In other words, I paid a million five to have it done.
Alec Baldwin: He gave you a budget of how much?
James Toback: Oh, he gave me a budget of $18 million, of which I received $500,000.00. So my net for the movie was minus a million and a half.
Alec Baldwin: You were down a million and a half.
James Toback: Yeah, but I didn’t care. I wanted to make the movie.
”—James Toback on the making of “Exposed” discussed on Alec Baldwin’s podcast in what is now my favorite How It Got Made story in all Hollywood history.