For true film lovers

Rating: 8/10 (27 January 2014)

After watching many of 2013's juggernauts (i.e. American Hustle, 12 Years a Slave, Captain Phillips etc), the Coen Brothers' finest film remains as my favorite for the year. If you are looking for a generic Hollywood movie with a neat plot, perhaps with a 'surprising' twist and other cheap crowd pleasers, this movie is not for you. However, if you truly love film for its core purpose of emotional evocation, your $10 will be well spent on this ticket.
Throughout the movie, I was finding it hard to cling to the slow moving story, as we follow Llewyn Davis through his unsuccessful musical career and life. But I realized that as soon we abandon our conventional approach to the way we watch movies, great films like this can be far more appreciated. This is not a movie that is driven by plot, but instead by mood and its atmosphere. Bruno Delbonnel's melancholy, wintry cinematography was clearly the film's greatest strength as it conveyed the growing sense of futility and gloom that Llewyn had to persevere.
Oscar Isaac portrays Llewyn Davis convincingly as the played-out, morose victim of many life failures. Through the entire film, his character expresses no enthusiasm notably due to his brokenness - however in one of the closing scenes, during his final song (Fare Thee Well), Isaac performs the song with truthful passion. At that point we see Llewyn's only real means of expression are left only through his art.
I saw this movie as a truthful representation of an artist's futile pursuit for success. However others may see it differently and more deeply as futility in one's life or perhaps as an atmospheric portrayal of America's early folk music industry. Such ambiguity is the beauty of great films.