Meh film of little warmth and compassion

Rating: 5/10 (9 August 2015)

I have just watched ILD and am disappointed. I generally love the Coen brothers, but this was decidedly lacking. Lacking in anything special, or anything particularly interesting. The film craftsmanship is typically good, well shot, well acted etc, but I did not care too much for the well being of our main character... whether he became homeless, lost the cat, lost his mind, I really did not care. For that, I blame the un likability of Llewyn. I wonder why he did not travel to see his 2 year old child? We go the point, him being a loser, early on, and nothing much else happened. I have seen slower paced films which i found far more engaging, for example, LOCKE, which is fantastic, and features simply a man in a car talking on the phone... for the WHOLE movie. That is way more powerful than this film, and I put that down to a lack of empathy one experiences when following the life of Lewyn Davis. His dilemmas, whether to quit or not, and whether to compromise his art to make money, are universal, but we don't really get INSIDE Lewyn Davis, certainly not enough to really care.