"Oh Brother Where Art Thou", unlike the Coen brothers' "Fargo" which was a mean-spirited parody on dumb talking Minnesotans, is rather a celebration of Southern culture, especially the twangy folk music. Instead of picking on the people of Mississippi, the film glorifies a slower way of life, during the Depression, when the unhappiness and sorrow of poverty and inequality blended as naturally in song as the promise of a resurrection. Taken loosely from Homer's "Odyssey", the film follows three quirky convicts who escape from a chain-gang detail. Delmar (wonderfully played by Tim Blake Nelson) is the blank face, impressionable simpleton who could run to a uninvited baptism as easily as he could believe his friend had turned into a frog. Pete (equally well acted by John Turturro) is the moral compass, a man who sternly believes in right and wrong even if it means changing reality to fit his principles. Everett (George Clooney) is the articulate, agnostic universal man, a champion of expediency. Together they immerse themselves into a real world they are ill-prepared to face. The use of white is significant in three places, from the mesmerized people marching to the waters, to the muses by the river banks, to the KKK meeting and anticipated lynching. Similarly the blind man is used initially as a prophet riding singularly on the rail, warning not the seek worldly treasures and then later on as a radio station owner who just happens to discover the 'soggy bottom boys'. There are subplots too, involving the escapades of George 'Baby Face' Nelson, the governor's race between an inept incumbent and his sly challenger, and a fight by Everett to win back his wife and five girls. George Cooney's versatility really shines here. The man who could take on the Iraqi army and a full Northeaster is just as comfortable comically acting out as one of the 'good ole boys'. The Coen brothers finally got it right in fashioning good taste around satire. In "Oh Brother Where Art Thou", life is really a series of serendipity events, in which being slow-witted becomes a virtue rather than a curse.
Review of O Brother, Where Art Thou?
