Inside Llewyn Davis

[MacGuffin]

Coen Brothers' 'Inside Llewyn Davis' Set For December 6 Release
BY THE DEADLINE TEAM

CBS Films announced today that Joel and Ethan Coen's Inside Llewyn Davis will see a limited release on December 6 and expand out on December 20, the heart of awards season. Oscar Isaac stars in the pic, which takes place in the folk-music circuit in downtown New York's Greenwich Village in the 1960s. Carey Mulligan, John Goodman, Garrett F. Hedlund, Murray Abraham and Justin Timberlake co-star. Scott Rudin and the Coen brothers produced.

CBS Films landed domestic distribution rights to the heavily buzzed-about film in February. Its first screening on the Sony lot drew a music crowd, a lot of movie stars and numerous studio execs, resulting in a ton of interest. Word is CBS Films got the pic for close to $4 million for U.S. rights after beating out two other bidders.

[MacGuffin]

Red Band Trailer

[Lottery]

Despite it looking weird visually, I'm starting to like the idea of this more (hey it's the Coens, so it's not too hard).

[©brad]

It looks weird visually?

[MacGuffin]

New Trailer

[MacGuffin]

New Trailer

[Mel]

Will watch interview later, but DP/30 typically is very solid.

[Just Withnail]

This was a good film about going in circles and just floating (though also about these circles being mostly self-imposed and caused by integrity). No build-up, no climax, just a steady drift towards...the beginning. Like a good Coen it somehow wears it's metaphors on it's sleeve ("Llewyn is the cat?") and instead of feeling contrived it feels...delicious.

The light and cold of winter is all over this, inside as well as outside. Llewyn (behind that stoic mask) seems to dread being stuck in a wintry loop while living off of the people around him who chooses stability over integrity, but he doesn't budge. Will he just stumble into the wilderness like that wounded cat in that beautiful shot?

[Drenk]

SPOILERS


I loved the movie when they talked about his friend who killed himself. It was not about Llewyn anymore, but about the lack of Llweyn & ?; I read somewhere that this movie is the way for the Coens to imagine the infinite grief they would have if one of them would die.

I also liked the silent guy who recites weird poems. And the scene when he sees the town where his son/daughter lives.

It looks like "basic" Coen, but it had more.

[Cloudy]

I'd basically echo what Drenk/Withnail said. Can't wait for future viewings....I need to see it a few more times, but I think I'd say it's one of my favorites lately.

It looks like "basic" Coen, but it had more.

Here's a great interview with the DP/Art director, they give some of the best insights into the creative process with the Coen's I've read:
http://www.icgmagazine.com/wordpress/2013/12/10/tangled-up-in-blue/

That driving sequence...the pit stops...John Goodman's character...Coen's hit something new here. I felt like the influence from Delbonnel doing Sokurov really helped this film...there was something Russian going on...the use of light was brooding and empty yet not, and had a philosophical stance of its own, mixed in with the face of Oscar Isaac, combined with the constantly screaming wind and endless fog...i got it.

[Drenk]

It could have been bigger as Llewyin could have been a big star with his dead friend or win some money with the rights of Mr Kennedy. The fact that the movie is short, often cuts, is what gives such a weird and deep feeling to it, behind what looks like simplicity...A feeling of what Llewyn misses. I'm totally fine with the movie as it is!

[pete]

It looks weird visually?

man does it ever. I think the movie probably didn't cost very much and it shows. there were some really ugly stuff, mixed with, of course, some really beautiful shots.

I really liked the movie. I liked the simple pleasure of just following a character and the oddity of the characters and how it was obvious that the movie is so much more beyond the plot it tells. there is still some clever stuff, and there is still an emotional satisfaction, though the movie is not just about a script that surprises you anymore. I love how it's obvious that there is more going on than scripts put on screen.

[jenkins]

my struggles and my soul were nourished by this movie

And the scene when he sees the town where his son/daughter lives.

oh fraaaance! cities in ohio are called towns elsewhere, but akron is the city of jarmusch and devo, it neighbors cleveland

[samsong]

the coens really like the odyssey.

i can't help but think of other movies while watching anything so what came to mind while i saw this was five easy pieces meets the devil probably, all by way of hong sang soo... if only for the elliptical structure, though hong consistently employs the device closer to the midway point in the film,  and i think gets much more out of it.  thematic retread it seems, though maybe it's their first movie about young people?  their worldview and style are as assured and ambivalent as ever, though definitely better expressed in other films... not their best (whereas i feel of late they've made a trent of one upping themselves with each new movie) but who cares.  really good.  i found it incredibly depressing.   oscar isaac is great, the music in this movie is pretty perfect and really elevates the movie.

[polkablues]

Good god, this movie wrecked me. This might be giving extra weight to the recency of the experience, but at this moment I feel it's the Coens' best film since Barton Fink.

I don't think there's a better film that's been made about the experience of losing a partner, of figuring out your place in the world as an individual rather than half of a piece. Of the world treating you differently because of a quality you lack on your own.  And facing up to the gnawing fear that it was, in fact, the other person that made you special, and now that they're gone, where does that leave you?

What the Coens do better than anyone else is to make the mundane mythic. At their best, their films activate that Joseph Campbell gland in the back of our brains that tells us this is more than a story, this is THE story, the current carrying us down the river of collective human experience. And it's funny, and it's dramatic, and whatever else, but it's more than that; it's important. It tells us something about ourselves that we all knew before we were born and then forgot.

And the music. Fuck. The music. Wrecked me.