Joel and Ethan Coen
By: R. Barton Palmer.
Series: Contemporary film directors
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Published: 2004
Place of publication: Urbana and Chicago
Language: eng
Number of pages: 207
Subjects: Coen, Joel -- Criticism and interpretation.; Coen, Ethan -- Criticism and interpretation.
Description: "With landmark films such as Fargo, O Brother Where art Thou?, Blood Simple, and Raising Arizona, the Coen brothers have achieved both critical and commercial success. Proving the existence of a viable market for "small" films that are also intellectually rewarding, their work has exploded generic conventions amid rich webs of transtextural references. In Joel and Ethan Coen, R. Barton Palmer argues that the Coen oeuvre also forms a central element in what might be called postmodernist filmmaking. Mixing high and low cultural sources and blurring genres like noir and comedy, the use of pastiche and anti-realist elements in films such as The Hudsucker Proxy and Barton Fink clearly fit the postmodernist paradigm. Palmer argues that for a full understanding of the Coen brothers unique position within film culture, it is important to see how they have developed a new type of text within general postmodernist practice that Palmer terms commercial/independent. Analyzing their substantial body of work from this "generic" framework is the central focus on this book."--Book cover.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [201]) and index.