The Coens' top achievement

Rating: 10/10 (15 August 2008)

I have a tendency not to compare the Coen brothers to other directors, seeing as they are among the most unique filmmakers in the world, but it is fair to say Fargo is their Pulp Fiction: a work of startling originality (in fact, their first truly original screenplay, rewarded with an Oscar) that showed they could do more than merely revisit classic genres, so brilliant the Academy chose to overlook it (the Best Picture award for 1996 was infamously given to The English Patient). It's a playful, exhilarating and shocking piece of cinema - the brothers' masterpiece.
The film's playfulness is exposed in the very beginning, as the opening caption states "This is a true story" (which, of course, it isn't). After that, it's straight into the action: three men talking in a diner. One of them is Jerry Lundegaard (William H. Macy), a car dealer whose financial troubles have led him to the hiring of the other two, Carl Showalter (Steve Buscemi) and Gaear Grimsrud (Peter Stormare). They are meant to kidnap Jerry's wife and ask his father-in-law Wade Gustafson (Harve Presnell) to pay a ransom which will be split in half between crooks and employer. However, just like in Reservoir Dogs (which also starred Buscemi), the best laid plans get screwed up beyond belief, resulting in a bloodbath that contrasts nicely with the snowy surroundings.
While Carl and Gaear keep getting in trouble and Jerry has to pretend everything is all right, the cops intervene as well; specifically, one cop, Marge Gunderson (the Oscar-winning Frances McDormand, aka Mrs. Joel Coen), whose natural kindness and determination make her the ideal choice for the job despite her being eight months pregnant.
Marge is one of the best film characters of the '90s, and undoubtedly the Coens' finest creation: whereas the protagonists of their previous movies were clever reinterpretations of genre types, she is a flesh-and-blood human being, with real emotions and a heart of gold. Her unique status as the only really good person in the film adds to the several endearing traits of McDormand's humane, warm performance. She is the audience's guide in a darkly humorous universe, populated by dishonest con-men, funny-talking prostitutes (the accents are supposedly of Scandinavian origin) and the psychotic Gaear, played by a career-best Stormare, whose double act with the fast-talking Buscemi adds to the in-joking since he is the only real Scandinavian in a movie full of fake Swedes and Danes (Lundegaard and Gustafson).
The unique setting of the film (apparently, the Coens' home region) plays really well to the brothers' knack for funny names (apart from the ones that have already been mentioned, one should remember that of Marge's husband, Norm "Son of a" Gunderson), quirky characters and sudden, brutal violence. The result is a once-in-a-lifetime blend of thriller, comedy and horror movie, the best film of 1996 and a milestone in (post)modern film-making. It may not be a true story, but why nag about that when the Coens' imagination is much more satisfying?