The Coen Brothers: Interviews

Conversations With Filmmakers Series

by William Rodney Allen (Editor)

Joel and Ethan Coen (b. 1954, 1957) started their careers in obscurity on a shoestring budget cajoled from family and friends in Minneapolis. Working entirely outside the studio system, the Coen brothers scored an unlikely first success in 1984 with their postmodern noir film Blood Simple. Two decades and nearly a dozen movies later, the Coens are now among the best-known writer/directors in Hollywood, turning out major studio releases featuring such stars as George Clooney, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Tom Hanks.

The Coens' films all share a distinctive, quirky ambience that critics have come to identify as "that Coen brothers feeling." Tricky moving camera work, frequent use of the voiceover, homages to directors and cinematic genres, a fascination with unexpected and off-kilter violence, and omnipresent black humor are all defining elements of the Coens' cinematic world.

From such highly stylized movies as Barton Fink and The Man Who Wasn't There to more mainstream but dark comedies such as Raising Arizona, Intolerable Cruelty, and O Brother, Where Art Thou?, the Coens are equally at home with existential despair and comic exuberance and are known for scripts packed with an obvious love for language. This collection of their most important interviews spans twenty years and is the most comprehensive published on the brothers.

Genres: Film, Nonfiction

246 pages, Paperback

First published August 18, 2006

About the author

American author and former Professor of English at the Louisiana School for Math, Science, and the Arts. He received his PhD from Duke University, and was a faculty member at LSMSA from the time the school first opened in 1983 until his retirement in 2011. He is married to Cindy Allen, a counselor at the school, and has two daughters, Emily and Claire, with her. He has many interests, which include and are not limited to playing guitar, reading, and cutting down Magnolia trees. He is also a Kurt Vonnegut fan and owns what is believed to be the last thing that Vonnegut wrote before his death in 2007, a postcard addressed to Allen.

Reviews

[Jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is just a collection of various interviews the duo have done over the years (organized by film), so there's quite a bit of repetitive information. That being said, as a long-time Coen bros. fanatic, there was plenty I learned in here that I didn't know before. My favorite chapters were those on Fargo, Miller's Crossing, and Barton Fink.

[Tim · Rating 3 out of 5]

In general books that are compilations of interviews are a good way to see inside the mind of a person. So being a fan of the Coen Brothers films I figured that reading this book of interviews that dates from the start of their career until the Ladykillers to be somewhat insightful. For the most part it wasn't. Instead of insight we get the brothers holding back any form of answers and being hard as possible as they're asked similar questions. When they open up there are some dazzling insights but it's not enough. The problem here isn't the people asking the questions (as these were the "best") but how they approached these interviews combatively. There's some good here but it's definitely a grating read after awhile.

[Kevin Duvall · Rating 4 out of 5]

For the most part, this is a really good set of interviews with the Coens. The best ones tend to come from film magazines or outlets known for in-depth interviews (the lengthy Playboy interview is a highlight). These tended to feature more film-specific questions and yield more insight into the Coens’ creative process. You also end up with some fun trivia bits.

Some of the articles, though, are really just short promotional pieces for when they had a new movie coming out. This is where the brothers get asked the same trite questions and seem to be trolling the interviewers with their answers. I found that kind of entertaining in its own right, but I wondered why some of them warranted inclusion in the book.

Overall I’d recommend it if you’re a big Coen Brothers fan or a college student writing a paper on them and looking for a lot of sources in one place (this is a university press book after all).

[Julesreads · Rating 5 out of 5]

“We’re not big on research and we just don’t care at certain point.”

Book of interviews ranging from Blood Simple up to the Ladykillers. The Coens — influences on my taste and general way of thinking about art, or more simply kindred spirits — go the extra mile to be coy, cagey, deflective, dismissive….but they do eventually (inevitably?) reveal what they care about specifically in relation to how others interact with their work and their working relationship. For that, it’s an informative read. If you want to know what The Big Lebowski is about or if they fight on set, well, just don’t ask.

[Nog · Rating 3 out of 5]

This suffers mostly from repetition; the interviewers tend to ask the same questions over and over. A few were downright awful; the questions were more of interest to readers of celebrity tabloids. But about 70 out of the 200 pages are pretty good. I recommend reading the ones by Positif, which is a French film magazine, and believe it or not, the Playboy interview. Read those first, and then browse.

[Jordan Muschler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this in like one day, which is funny considering how repetitive some of these interviews are and how done the Coens seem with press half the time. But there are glimmers of brilliance and insight throughout and they are worth finding.

[j_ay · Rating 4 out of 5]

Covers up to The Ladykillers.
Which is just as well, since right before that flick (shudder) I stopped paying attention to The Brothers...

[Mohammad Mahdi Safi · Rating 4 out of 5]

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