Miller's Crossing

It didn't take long for me to decide what movie I wanted to watch for this blog post. As soon as we saw that clip of John Turturro's character being walked through the woods to get taken out, I wanted to watch the entire movie anyways. This way I killed two birds with one stone, and the film lived up to all my expectations and then some. Right out of the Prohibition years, it is a classic gangster flick that contained situations that only Micheal Corleone would feel suited to fix. But instead a smart mouthed Tom (Byrne) fits the role like a glove. Based off the novel, The Glass Key its the prefect addition to a collection with such movies as The Godfather, Knock Around Guys, and American Gangster.

The review of the movie I read to compare thoughts to was one off of http://www.cornponeflicks.org/millers.html. A review by Matt Muray. Honestly this was the first review I read so I didn't hunt around for it and yet I find myself arguing with many of his statements. He does start off the review by making an ass of himself by pretending to bark like a seal but he did it to show the enthusiasm that he has for the film. I agree with him on the fact that words can not properly describe this movie.

The undertone of the film is something that strikes fear deep inside showing the underlying evil that people possess. Much like in other films we watched in class the Coens highlight the fact that people will do what is necessary to ensure their well being. In Raising Arizona HI kidnaps a baby, and faces the dark soled character of Leanord Smalls, in Fargo the wife gets kidnapped because her husband wants to protect his own honor and has the evil presents of Gaear Grimsrud, and in No Country for Old Men $2 million drives the character to face "The Ultimate bad ass" Anton Chigurh. Miller's Crossing also has it overall evil being, Eddie Dane. He is not as evil as Anton but all four of the evil character seem to represent the evil that people are capable of. It seems to me that the Coens aren't exactly the glass half full kind of people, since even in the happiest of the movies I've listed there is an Angel of Death character. Tom himself fight what he must do to stay alive. He has a set of morals he live by and he isn't the type to kill which a sold reason creating more character development.

One thing that I disagree with Matt Muray about is he completely misses the connection that Leo and Tom had. Just speculation but I fell the film showed that the two had a long relationship together. They most likely rose to their positions of power together. Why else would Leo trust Tom as lefthand man, and treat hims with more respect then was given? This shows why Leo throws Tom out when he admit to being with his women. This drives the plot not the hunt of Bernie. If it was simple that then it would not matter whether Bernie was killed, or Tom crossing over to Caspar's side.

The last dramatic connection I made among the films was the power of the opening sense. In Raising Arizona HI character is clearly show and the bases for the plot is established in 10 minutes before the opening credits. In Fargo we see how far Jerry is willing to go to not have to be in debt to his father in law. And in No Country For Old Men Sheriff Bell give a powerful speech about the old way of the law. In Miller's Crossing we see the power Tom has in controlling the situation.

The last nondramatic thing was I noticed the emphasis on seemingly unimportant things. Like the tattoo HI and Leanord shared, of the reflection of Anton and Bell in the TV. Now in this film it was Tom's hat. It was never shown to be that important, like a gift from his father or anything significant but yet it kept coming up making me think that in every Coen brother's film there are hidden messages of seemingly unimportant things.

Well I guess I'll wrap this up before I start talking about subliminal messages coming through in those details. But I will conclude with this, If you have yet to see Miller's Crossing stand up right now and walk to your car. Now once you're there get in and don't come home until you have found a copy to watch, pop it in and get ready to be amazed.