...one of the most hilariously twisted murder mysteries to come along since, well, since never.
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The biggest knock I had about the previous incarnations of "Fargo" on DVD was that neither the PolyGram nor the MGM disc included any substantial extras, so I was looking forward to this new MGM "Special Edition" being something a little more...umm...special. It is, with an improved picture quality and a few extras, but I doubt it's so special that anybody who already owns one of the previous DVDs would want to buy the new one. For those of you don't own the disc, however, now is as good a time as any to hie thee to a video store.
Love 'em or hate 'em, there have been few filmmakers quite like brothers Ethan and Joel Coen. Part of their bizarre sense of humor in "Fargo" was to make a black-comedy film noir almost entirely in white. What's the French term for "light film"? "Fargo" is a comedy thriller set in and around Fargo, North Dakota, in the dead of winter. Everywhere you look, there's snow. Miles and miles of snow. The movie opens in snow, closes in snow, and in between locates each of its murders in snow.
Like the color of snow, the movie is unpretentious, unexpected, and except for a couple of brief scenes of violent brutality, low-key, one of the most hilariously twisted murder mysteries to come along since, well, since never. Until 1996, there was never anything quite like it, and people certainly stood up and took notice. The movie was a financial success at the box office, a critical success with reviewers, and an Oscar winner with the Academy. It came away with awards for Best Actress (Frances McDormand) and Best Original Screenplay (Joel and Ethan Coen), plus nominations for Best Picture, Best Director (Joel Coen), Best Supporting Actor (William H. Macy), Best Editing (the Coens), and Best Cinematography (Roger A. Deakins). The only question is why it didn't win more Oscars than it did. Yawh, a good question.
The plot begins with a car salesman, Jerry Lundegaard (Macy), talking to a pair of thugs, Carl Showalter (Steve Buscemi) and Gaear Grimsrud (Peter Stormare), about doing a kidnapping. Lundegaard, it seems, is desperate for quick cash and has concocted a scheme to get it. He wants the two heavies to kidnap his wife and hold her for a million-dollar ransom. He plans for his rich, tough-guy, cheapskate father-in-law, Wade Gustafson (Harve Presnell), to pony up the money, which he will split with the kidnappers. Sounds easy enough, until everything that could wrong does go wrong. Yawh.
In the course of driving their victim away in an automobile that's part of their payment, the two not-so-bright villains get stopped by a state trooper, whom they kill, and then get spotted by two passersby, whom they kill. Yawh, and that's not all.
The film may have set a record for the length of time it takes for the star to appear. At about thirty-five minutes in, Police Chief Marge Gunderson (McDormand) is called to investigate the triple homicide. She is the most improbable detective hero the movies have ever seen. She's often hooded by a parka, quiet, straight-faced, thorough, sharp, and extremely pregnant. It doesn't take her long to find a connection between the killings and the car salesman. But it's not fast enough to stop the two idiot kidnappers from continuing their murderous rampage. There is surely no honor among thieves as eventually the two morons turn on one another. By the time we get to an episode involving a wood chipper, well, yawh, I kid you not.
In the film's preface, we read: "The events depicted in this film took place in Minneapolis in 1987. At the request of the survivors, the names have been changed. Out of respect for the dead, the rest has been told exactly as it occurred." We are supposed to accept that the story really did take place, but don't be surprised that the Coens are putting us on. The actual police chief involved with the case, for instance, assures us he was never pregnant.
Maybe the best scenes in the film are the ones between McDormand and Macy. She is calm, cool, collected, sweet, and professional as she steadily bores in with her questioning. He is nervous, fidgety, excitable, and just ready to go over the edge when he realizes his simple ransom plan is turning more haywire by the minute.
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