3.5/5
The Cohen brothers are the very successful producer/ director team behind Fargo, Oh! Brother Where Art Thou and No Country For Old Men. When they are on top of their game, they are brilliant. When they miss, they miss big, like they did with The Man Who Wasn't There and Intolerable Cruelty.
A Serious Man is very Jewish. In fact, there are parts of it that people may not get unless they are familiar with Jews and Judaism.
I thought the acting was solid. The main character, a stressed out professor, even reminded me of one of my Jewish friends, in terms of his awkwardness, voice and just how he carried himself. The guy's wife is leaving him for an older Jewish widower, who is hilarious in his attempts to smooth the transition from the guy being married to divorced. Meanwhile, the guy's older, oddball brother lives in the house and seems to be constantly hogging the bathroom.
The story that the rabbi tells about the dentist finding a kabalah-like message carved into a patient's teeth is also quite funny.
Based in Minnesota, the houses look not unlike some of the housing in Winnipeg.
This just doesn't have the feel of their huge hit, Oh! Brother..., but it has plenty of funny, anxious moments and some people will enjoy it. I didn't care for the ending, which sort of left things feeling unresolved, much like the ending in No Country For Old Men.
The film is preceded by a weird film with subtitles that I found pointless.
The Cohen brothers are the very successful producer/ director team behind Fargo, Oh! Brother Where Art Thou and No Country For Old Men. When they are on top of their game, they are brilliant. When they miss, they miss big, like they did with The Man Who Wasn't There and Intolerable Cruelty.
A Serious Man is very Jewish. In fact, there are parts of it that people may not get unless they are familiar with Jews and Judaism.
I thought the acting was solid. The main character, a stressed out professor, even reminded me of one of my Jewish friends, in terms of his awkwardness, voice and just how he carried himself. The guy's wife is leaving him for an older Jewish widower, who is hilarious in his attempts to smooth the transition from the guy being married to divorced. Meanwhile, the guy's older, oddball brother lives in the house and seems to be constantly hogging the bathroom.
The story that the rabbi tells about the dentist finding a kabalah-like message carved into a patient's teeth is also quite funny.
Based in Minnesota, the houses look not unlike some of the housing in Winnipeg.
This just doesn't have the feel of their huge hit, Oh! Brother..., but it has plenty of funny, anxious moments and some people will enjoy it. I didn't care for the ending, which sort of left things feeling unresolved, much like the ending in No Country For Old Men.
The film is preceded by a weird film with subtitles that I found pointless.
