The movie "Inside Llewyn Davis" is presented by the Coen Brothers in a style that reminded me of a record on that turntable. The end is the beginning and vice versa. You can "drop the needle" anywhere in the middle and start enjoying. Like most record albums, there doesn't seem to be much conclusion. Just tracks / stories that either affect you or don't. If you've seen enough Coen Brothers' films, no conclusion is no real surprise, but there is a lot for the eyes and ears along the way to make viewing it worthwhile.
In the film, the Coens present a contrast of a man who makes astoundingly beautiful music and yet is really one of the biggest jerks you could imagine. "Everything you touch turns to shit," a female friend whom he has thoughtlessly impregnated hisses at him "You're like King Midas' idiot brother."
Not so much an idiot, really, but more of just a handsome, mellow, selfish folk singer who is obsessed with achieving his own vague ideal for success in music: becoming famous but not too commercial and never "selling out." Even worse, failing and then simply "existing" as he sees his sister - a New York City housewife, then rotting away like his once famous merchant-marine father in an old-sailor's home.
With "Inside Llewyn Davis," life is about choices we make, doors that don't close quickly enough, off-ramps taken or not, incredible journeys that aren't really or don't seem like it until looking back when they are over, and the fallacy of "legitimacy" in music. Does a musician really have to live the blues if he wants to sing them, too? After all, if you write or perform a folk song lamenting your death hanging by a noose, doesn't the fact that you're not dead make you a phony? Could it be simply enough to just imagine it? Or sing your own version of an old song? For the people living around Greenwich Village in the late 50's / early 60's this was important and forms a nice background for this, sort of, anti-musical.
One other movie this reminded me of was "Almost Famous." In that really good film, a young reporter (so young he has to lie about his age) follows around a rock band in the 1970's to do a story about them for Rolling Stone magazine. Some of the same ideals about art and music are explored. Is it ok to tell a big lie to get to the "real truth?" Can image be more important than reality? Why are artists sometimes obsessed with "real people" when there probably just isn't such a thing. What is it that we really love about music?
The highlights of Inside Llewyn Davis are cinematography, dialogue and great melodies. Hearing them performed well is good enough for most of us. Getting "inside" the musician is a bonus. But one that really never leads to a brighter truth. Just more stories of life - and another track on the album.
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This is the press release given to critics before the film debuted at the Cannes film festival. It is very enlightening as to the subject matter because it was written by the co-author of the book on which the film is based. This release could be read before of after seeing the movie, and really provides great background.
http://www.festival-cannes.fr/assets/Image/Direct/049141.pdf
