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The Coen Brothers

The modern influence. The tommy-gun firing dialogue. The Roderick Jaynes – editor (look him up). The Joel director, Ethan producer. The boys who have finally credited themselves as an equal team. The only other directors who have perfected the wide dolly shots as clean as Stanley Kubrick.

Filmmakers may or may not be liable for their Coen-brother imitation. Repeating an unusual phrase – the Coen brother trademark – is never as blatant as “Shut the ____ up, Donny” (“The Big Lebowski”) or inquiring as to the type of wood flooring (“Burn After Reading”). And greasy characters screaming, quirky hillbillies chewing, pregnant silences after personal opinions are revealed, and unusual car situations may all be Coen segments imbedded into creative filmmakers without their ever knowing it.

If a non-Coen scene has the natural unnaturalness of a Coen picture, a Coen fan may assume the filmmaker to be a fan. But what if he’s not? What if the filmmaker dislikes the Coen brothers and happened to pluck a movie method, movie manner, or an automatic approach that happened to be invented by the brothers?

Is TV’s “Boardwalk Empire” aware of the Coen’s 1920′s period piece films and the similar oddball phrasing? The giggling Mickey Doyle (Paul Sparks) is a character who could have walked off the Coen brother’s “Miller’s Crossing” set and over to HBO’s. How about “Nucky” Thompson’s assistant Eddie Kessler (Anthony Laciura) – is he a cousin to Lou (Joe Polito) of the “Barton Fink” Hollywood lot?

How “Mad Men”? Did they mean to mimic the Coen tone as they hauled a dead secretary through the office? Was Mr. Mussburger (Paul Newman – “The Hudsucker Proxy”) pulling the strings, smoking a cigar from the top floor above Cooper’s office? How about that dreamland-L.A. escape Mad Men Don Draper had with a petite and luscious girly named Joy? Wasn’t that the atmosphere of a Coen brother’s summer day?

“Bad Santa” also rings Coen brothers, but doesn’t jingle all the way. They executive produced and are said to be the bro-brains behind the story. Did they have a hand on the script or camera once their names were put upon the credits? And on set or not, was the duo crisscrossing wires in director Terry Zwigoff’s head or whispering an overabundance of obscenities to be spit by Billy Bob Thornton (who had previously worked with the brothers twice – “The Man Who Wasn’t There” and “Intolerable Cruelty”)?

Let’s not know. We don’t need to know everything.

Maybe the brothers were nudging elbows on “Bad Santa.” Maybe the creators of “Mad Men” are Coen fans. Maybe they were stalking around the set of “Boardwalk Empire” (considering Kelly Macdonald and Michael Stuhlbarg are of the Coen family as well as Steve Buscemi who has been in six Coen films).

Joel and Ethan’s dedication to story, characters, dialogue (dialect), sets, sounds, and cast members seats them in their own chairs, be it director or producer (always writer). They haven’t reclined those chairs. They haven’t gotten comfortable. They’re not officially in the common world with the likes of Spielberg and Eastwood, but the brotherly team is regarded as two of the finest filmmakers. And they’ve set and pushed their own boundaries.

In the past few years, the Coens attempted a musical (“O Brother, Where Art Thou?”), adapted a novel (“No Country for Old Men”), daringly remade two previously-admired classics (“The Ladykillers” and “True Grit”), contributed a short story in “Paris, Je T’Aime” (short “Tuileries”), and used a relatively no-name actor for a lead role (“A Serious Man”). Not outlandish enough? How about Justin Timberlake being in their next project?

Not every filmmaker is going to study the comic timing of stealing diapers (“Raising Arizona”) or pretend a story is true (“Fargo”); but the recent Chinese film “A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop” (remake of the first Coen endeavor – “Blood Simple”) proves they get around.

Inspired filmmakers may not always know why they do the things they do, but the Coen brothers influence our minds, our scope, our stories. The art work of movies is forever enhanced because of them.

Thanks, bros.

True Grit (2010)

A Serious Man (2009)

Burn After Reading (2008)

No Country for Old Men (2007)

Paris, Je T’Aime (“Tuileries”) (2006)

The Ladykillers (2004)

Intolerable Cruelty (2003)

The Man Who Wasn’t There (2001)

O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)

The Big Lebowski (1998)

Fargo (1996)