And it's the only color that stands out. Blood Simple is often painted with shadow and light-not only the traditional ribbons of illumination streaming into the darkness through Venetian blinds, or the spider's web of light and dark that crisscross the walls, but in new, inventive ways. Like the shafts of light that rush through the bullet holes left by a killer shooting at McDormand from behind a wafer-thin wall. Blood Simple is beautifully composed sonically and visually. The thud-thud of ceiling fans whirling through the muggy nights becomes the film's pulsebeat.
Faucets drip like torture.
Furtive-faced McDormand listens for disturbing portents just out of ear's range. Here, the Coens appear indebted to David Lynch, the master of subtly unsettling sound effects. It's classic film noir. He hires seedy private detective M. Emmet Walsh to kill McDormand and Getz, but Walsh double-crosses Hedaya, offering altered photographs of the couple's dead bodies as proof of a murder he never committed. The plot breaks down after awhile-it's difficult to fathom why anyone is doing what they're doing.