Hail, Caesar!
Directed by: Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Written by: Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Starring: Josh Brolin, George Clooney, Alden Ehrenreich, Channing Tatum, Ralph Fiennes, Tilda Swinton, Scarlett Johansson, Jonah Hill, Frances McDormand, Veronica Osorio, Heather Goldenhirsh, Max Baker, Fisher Stevens, Clancy Brown, Fred Melamed, Robert Picardo, Alison Pill, Wayne Knight, Michael Gambon
Comedy/Drama/Music - 106 min Reviewed by Charlie Juhl on 4 Feb 2016
Written by: Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Starring: Josh Brolin, George Clooney, Alden Ehrenreich, Channing Tatum, Ralph Fiennes, Tilda Swinton, Scarlett Johansson, Jonah Hill, Frances McDormand, Veronica Osorio, Heather Goldenhirsh, Max Baker, Fisher Stevens, Clancy Brown, Fred Melamed, Robert Picardo, Alison Pill, Wayne Knight, Michael Gambon
Comedy/Drama/Music - 106 min Reviewed by Charlie Juhl on 4 Feb 2016
My wife noticed a few years ago I tend to appreciate books about books. I will read well known authors’ works about the books they love or mysteries involving a rare book. To a certain extent, this preference extends to cinema. I don’t seek out movies specifically when they are about movies, but I enjoy some movies very much if what they show regarding behind the scenes movie making is particularly well done. The Coen brothers have a proven track record creating stories and movies evoking a well-defined, concentrated era. They served us a Depression comedy in O Brother, Where Art Thou, Greenwich Village at the beginning of the ‘60s folk explosion in Inside Llewyn Davis, and now swim around in Hollywood’s Golden Age in the early ‘50s. Rather than mock this era of studio primacy, the Coens celebrate it; they lovingly pay homage to it, even though they cloak the honor in comedy, satire, and wit. Hail, Caesar! is a refreshing and creative return to classic Coen brothers brainy comedy; the kind they douse with clever, cheeky one-liners. We should include it during any discussion of the Coen’s greatest comedies.
I suspect a lot of people will walk out thinking the Coens are making fun of the old studio system and ignorant celebrities. Once again, George Clooney (Tomorrowland) plays a bumbling, goofy oddball, perhaps the fourth time he performs this function for the Coens. As Baird Whitlock, Clooney plays 1951’s biggest star and the leading man of Capitol Pictures’ biggest film, the biblical epic, "Hail, Caesar!: A Story of The Christ." A group calling itself ‘The Future’ kidnaps Whitlock demanding a $100,000 ransom for his return. Naturally, after Baird’s disappearance but before the ransom note, most people assume Baird is on another bender or shacking up with one of his mistresses. Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin, Inherent Vice), Capitol Pictures’ fixer, enforcer, and celeb caretaker, is the guy who makes sure incidents like this stay out of the gossip pages.
I suspect a lot of people will walk out thinking the Coens are making fun of the old studio system and ignorant celebrities. Once again, George Clooney (Tomorrowland) plays a bumbling, goofy oddball, perhaps the fourth time he performs this function for the Coens. As Baird Whitlock, Clooney plays 1951’s biggest star and the leading man of Capitol Pictures’ biggest film, the biblical epic, "Hail, Caesar!: A Story of The Christ." A group calling itself ‘The Future’ kidnaps Whitlock demanding a $100,000 ransom for his return. Naturally, after Baird’s disappearance but before the ransom note, most people assume Baird is on another bender or shacking up with one of his mistresses. Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin, Inherent Vice), Capitol Pictures’ fixer, enforcer, and celeb caretaker, is the guy who makes sure incidents like this stay out of the gossip pages.
The studios protected and coddled their superstars back in the ‘50s. The general public in the flyover states assumed movie stars were like the characters they played on screen: pure, sweet, and paragons of morality. In 2016, we all know Hollywood stars were some of the worst examples of morality on the planet, but Hollywood was selling a fantasy back then, not just with their products, but through those they set up as role models. Capitol Pictures looks like a combination of Warner Brothers and MGM with the vast studio lot and enormous influence they wield. Early on, Mannix shows up at a young starlet’s house and ‘donates’ some cash to the police officer retirement fund if a certain incident remains off the radar.
Eddie Mannix probably has no precise job description because everything requires his attention. He knows when a certain celebrity has a problem before they do. He deceives the circling gossip columnists with pre-planned devices such as a new studio romance between stars he promises will be exclusives. These are not romances; however, they are marching orders from the boss to appear at a movie premiere together to give the press something to munch on while they ignore the much larger felonies and debauchery being swept under the rug behind the curtain.
Hobie Doyle (Alden Ehrenreich, Beautiful Creatures) is the Gene Autry of Capitol Pictures. His convincing cowboy persona is bona fide because he shows off impressive lasso skills, can operate a horse at full gallop, and can sit in a rocking chair with an acoustic guitar singing about that lazy ol’ moon. Mannix tells Hobie to show up at the premiere of his new western with Carlotta Valdez (Victoria Osorio) as his date. Valdez is a Carmen Miranda knock-off, but both stars are either wise or dumb enough to follow orders without question. Hobie only briefly furrows his brow at the powers that be when they attempt to recast his image from cowboy to suave drawing room operator.
Hobie’s scenes attempting to pull off a posh northeastern accent in a tuxedo/ball gown saturated mansion are hysterical. Director Laurence Laurentz (Ralph Fiennes, Spectre) visibly fends off a stroke as he vainly attempts to rid Hobie of his Texas drawl and acquire highbrow annunciation. All of these behind the scenes films allude to a larger Coen brothers effort to play with ’50s film genres. There are enormous sets showing off what it looked like to create a biblical epic with marching Roman columns full of soldiers and there is a large indoor water tank used to shoot DeeAnna Moran’s (Scarlett Johansson, Avengers: Age of Ultron) latest Esther Williams like aquatic spectacular. Channing Tatum (The Hateful Eight) plays Burt Gurney as a Fred Astaire / Gene Kelly musical tap dancer. Even when off set, the Coens play with genre showing Mannix roam the wet streets at night going into shabby office buildings just like a boiling film noir.
Don’t forget, Hail, Caesar! is funny. There are brilliant lines such as, “You can hardly share in your own ransom, that would be unethical.” And this gem, “We’re not talking money, we’re talking economics!” Frances McDormand (The Good Dinosaur) shows up in a bit part but may be one of the most memorable supporting characters in the film as a chain smoking, myopic film editor. The Coens shoot Mannix as a blue collar guy, the man who gets the job done. They shoot the mini-films within the film with their respective star treatments. Channing Tatum’s musical number is a Technicolor marvel and Scarlett Johansson’s synchronized swimmers could come from any actual Busby Berkeley choreographed cavalcade. The Coens are playing with the ‘50s, irreverently, but respectfully. I have no doubt that as Hail, Caesar! is rewatched and dissected in the years to come, dozens more off-hand and subtle references to a time now gone will be discovered.
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