# "The Man Who Wasn't There" - new Coen brothers movie! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 16, 2001, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764 "2001-11-16T17:31:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/1 "2001-11-16T17:31:54Z")
I just heard about this this morning. Does anybody have any advance word on this flick? The title sounds familiar, like it might be a remake of an older film, but I doubt the Coen brothers would do a remake. ---
**Author:** ![Beadalin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3be4f8/32.png) [@Beadalin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beadalin)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/2 "2001-11-16T17:42:14Z")
Here’s a [decent review](http://www.theonionavclub.com/reviews/cinema/cinema_m/manwhowasntthere02.html) of it. I saw it last week, and I thought it was terrific. Very much an old-school noir-type movie, though it is certainly not a remake. Go see it, by all means! ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/3 "2001-11-16T18:18:45Z")
Any Coen-style humorous touches, or do they play this one straight? ---
**Author:** ![Beadalin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3be4f8/32.png) [@Beadalin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beadalin)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/4 "2001-11-16T18:43:12Z")
This is very much a Coen Brothers movie, with all its attendant humor, violence and underlying sympathetic humanity. There are quite a few parts that are laugh-out-loud funny, the kind where little giggles keep trickling out of the audience for a while after the scene. Frances McDormand is, as usual, terrific, and the writing is incredibly sharp. But then again, I’m a Coen Brothers fan. Here’s the official movie site: [http://www.themanwhowasntthere.com/](http://www.themanwhowasntthere.com/) ---
**Author:** ![Manduck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manduck/32/256_2.png) [@Manduck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Manduck)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/5 "2001-11-16T18:57:22Z")
The reason it sounds familiar is because there was a [cheeseball Steve Guttenberg movie](http://us.imdb.com/Title?0085892) with the same title. Totally unrelated other than the title, though. ---
**Author:** ![Sweet\_Sota\_Girl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@Sweet\_Sota\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sweet_Sota_Girl)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/6 "2001-11-16T18:57:59Z")
My SO and I are planning to see it this weekend… Now that I’ve heard your reviews, I’m even more psyched! Woo hoo! ---
**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/7 "2001-11-17T03:27:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by pugluvr \* > \*\*The title sounds familiar, like it might be a remake of an older film, but I doubt the Coen brothers would do a remake. \*\* Perhaps the title sounds familiar because it is familiar: > [@](#): > > **Antigonish** by Hughes Mearns > \* > As I was walking up the stair > **I met a man who wasn’t there!** > He wasn’t there again today! > I wish, I wish he’d stay away!\* ---
**Author:** ![Manduck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manduck/32/256_2.png) [@Manduck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Manduck)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 9:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/8 "2001-11-17T09:11:38Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by pugluvr \* > \*\*I doubt the Coen brothers would do a remake. \*\* Miller’s Crossing is _almost_ a remake of The Glass Key. Not quite, but if you like Miller’s Crossing you’ll like The Glass Key, and you’ll definitely notice some striking similarities. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/9 "2001-11-17T19:31:49Z")
Well, they sorta did a remake of _The Odyssey_ 🙂 Anyhoo, _The Man Who Wasn’t There_ is pretty excellent. Not my favorite Cohen Brothers flick, but definately worth seeing. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Mick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/838e76/32.png) [@The\_Mick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Mick)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2001, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/10 "2001-11-18T07:36:37Z")
I saw that tonight. Slow as hell, but it was okay. Most of it was close ups of Billy Bob, his expression never changing while he did voice-overs and smoked cigarette after cigarette after cigarette. Oh, and one cigar. ---
**Author:** ![Bossk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7feea3/32.png) [@Bossk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bossk)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/11 "2001-11-19T00:17:11Z")
If there was any justice in this world (which there isn’t), Tony Shalhoub should take home the Best Supporting Actor Oscar. ---
**Author:** ![SolomonGrundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d07c76/32.png) [@SolomonGrundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SolomonGrundy)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/12 "2001-11-19T02:25:58Z")
I thought it was a brilliant movie, and every single performance in it was dead-on perfect. But it was sllllooooowwww. I get a lot of grief from friends because _Miller’s Crossing_ is my favorite movie of all time; they usually claim that it was “boring.” But _Miller’s Crossing_ is a non-stop roller-coaster ride compared to _The Man Who Wasn’t There_. When I first heard about the movie, my reaction was, “Hmmm, the Coen brothers doing film noir. Didn’t they already do that with _Blood Simple_?” That turned out to be very simplistic. While I still think _Blood Simple_ is a great movie, it still just a film noir updated and set in Texas and then given the wacky Coen brothers spin. My overly pretentious take on _The Man Who Wasn’t There_ is that these guys know now that they can make any type of movie they want; the challenge is to go one step further and get to the heart of the genre itself. This movie would stand as an excellent film noir in its own right, but it takes a step back and goes into all the stuff that generated film noir in the first place. Movies (and books) like _Double Indemnity_ and _Sunset Boulevard_ and even _Invasion of the Body Snatchers_ didn’t just “happen”. There was this undercurrent of paranoia throughout everything – fear of the A-bomb, mistrust of other races and homosexuals, fear of UFO’s – that bred stories with characters who are all duplicitous or suspicious or just basically miserable. Every character in the movie either has no moral compass or has one that’s seriously out of whack, and Billy Bob’s character is the one who’s observing everything, looking for some way to explain it all or escape from it. Yipes, too many cinema studies classes in college. Anyway, it’s a great movie. Not my favorite of the Coen brothers’ stuff, just because it’s not quite as much fun as most of the others. But it’s still a great movie. ---
**Author:** ![Sweet\_Sota\_Girl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@Sweet\_Sota\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sweet_Sota_Girl)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/13 "2001-11-19T02:39:25Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Bossk \* > \*\*If there was any justice in this world (which there isn’t), Tony Shalhoub should take home the Best Supporting Actor Oscar. \*\* Maybe I’m showing my movie naiveness here, but was Tony’s part big enough for him to be considered? I agree that he did a great job with the part, I’m just wondering if the part was big enough? ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/14 "2001-11-19T07:03:08Z")
Watch “Shakespeare in Love” again and see how many lines Judy Dench has. Tony Shaloub has a LOT more. To be nominated for Best Supporting, you just need to have the studio push you for it. ---
**Author:** ![Mofo\_Rising](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Mofo\_Rising](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mofo_Rising)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2001, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-man-who-wasnt-there-new-coen-brothers-movie/93764/15 "2001-12-02T06:26:10Z")
I just watched it not but an hour ago, and I must say I liked it. For the most part. As usual, the Coen brothers are always just a little to clever for their own good. But that’s not always a bad thing. For this movie, I couldn’t really figure out what it was about. I could see what was going on, but why? What were they trying to say? My question was wrapped up somewhat by the conclusion of the movie, but I don’t know how well that applies if you look through that filter at the rest of the movie. At any rate, the conclusion was effective enough for me that I was vaguely in Billy Bob’s “headspace” for a while after the movie ended. (Of course, this beer I’m drinking is shaking that off.) My question is, did they frame Billy Bob so his figure was completely black throughout the movie, or did that only come into play near the end? I know I didn’t notice it until the end, so I’m hoping some more perceptive soul can clue me in.