Many comedies fly by with no external layering to their stories. They are simply improv machines where characters truly say some funny things, but the whole situation doesn’t actually feel very interesting or affecting of the comedy itself, other than to deliver the characters to a place where they can say funny things. Take, for example, the excellent comedy, Bridesmaids, which is a really great film, but its frame of taking place at a wedding doesn’t do much for the film other than letting funny stuff happen at a bridesmaids party, a wedding dress fitting and of course at a wedding. But sometimes in a blue moon, you get a comedy that by simply existing is contextualized by history. As of recent, the film that partakes in this is the Coen Brothers Hail, Caesar, a film that just by existing is a commentary on the conditions of old Hollywood which enriches an otherwise simple Coen comedy. Hollywood in the time period that Hail, Caesar is attempting to parody was a machine churning out films of increasing size and gravitas. Hail, Caesar obviously takes place at said time because it specifically parodies, Ben Hur, with the subtitle of the film “A Tale of the Christ,” becoming the punchline to an incredibly funny joke, accenting the ridiculous nature of plugging Christ into filmmaking, just to appeal to a wide audience (and if we’re speaking frankly, in order to put more boobs and gore into the movies). This context though takes the whole creation of the film into a whole different level, as the joke of the movie soon becomes itself the extent that the Brothers delve into recreating the trappings of old 50’s Hollywood. In their own attempt to recreate the time period, the Coen’s, have highlighted the absurdity of the lengths that old Hollywood went to, to create pictures of such an epic scale. Said absurdity does the film itself a wonderful favor, bolstering the ever present comedic tone of the piece, and keeping it from feeling a bit shallow. Hail, Caesar is built on this absurdity, with most of the scenes consisting of elaborate, drawn of sequences, highlighting the now ridiculous trappings of old Hollywood. Early in the film, this is represented by the parody of Ben Hur, titled Hail Caesar. Ben Hur, was a thousand of extras movie, and that, in this day and age, is just ridiculous, but also noble in its scale. The Coen’s themselves employed a lot of extras, who highlight this absurdity by just being there. There’s an outer narrative to the film that is just as funny as the inner narrative of Hollywood idiots, and this narrative tells the story of the almost absurd and hilarious lengths that the filmmakers must go to make a movie the same way that they did in the 50’s. This is again found in the film’s next sequence recreating the films of old Hollywood. This one is a parody of a mermaid film that is spectacularly impressive but also absolutely ridiculous to the point that it leads to the audience questioning the Coen Brothers devotion to recreating it. Touches like a mechanical whale and the synchronized swimming, lend themselves to making the moment seem all the more absurd, all leading one to see both the glorification and ridicule of the methods of old Hollywood. Glorification is as much present as ridicule, with each sequence being choreographed to the point of being stupidly impressive. The synchronized swimming sequence is one of the most fascinating and beautiful sequences ever put to film. By modern standards, it may be absurd, but it is amazing and there’s a lot of work put into it. The fact that a sequence of such beauty can have so much fun with itself, enlivens the prose of Hail, Caesar and gives the hilarity context. Said story being placed against the idiocy of the main cast of actors, chiefly George Clooney’s Baird Whitlock and Channing Tatum’s Burt Gunnery and the incompetence of the Communists at the center, shown with their self-aggrandizing importance, creates a sense of the exciting if a bit stupid energy of old Hollywood. Upon watching Hail, Caesar for the first time, I found myself disappointed by the film’s lack of depth in its prose. It just seemed the actions of a bunch of idiots that didn’t actually have very much to say or be excited about, but when analyzing the contexts of what Hail, Caesar both loves and makes fun of, the comedy takes on a new light, of such incredible quality that it makes one sit up and realize just how amazing and hilarious this bygone era of Hollywood was. Bibliography 1. Hail, Caesar. Dir. Joel and Ethan Coen. Perf. Josh Brolin. 2016. DVD.
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AuthorStephen Tronicek. Archives
July 2017
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