Fargo: The Coens' Snowbound Morality Play

Tue, 02 Apr 2024 10:00:00 +0000

Fargo (1996) opens with a title card swearing the film is a true story, that the events occurred in Minnesota in 1987, and that only the names have been changed at the survivors’ request. It is a lie. There was no true story; the Coen brothers invented the caveat to prime the audience for a particular kind of belief, so that when the wood-chipper turns up you accept it as something the world actually coughed up rather than something two clever screenwriters devised. That opening fib tells you exactly what kind of film-maker you are dealing with — playful, controlling, and far more sincere underneath than the surface irony admits.

Frances McDormand - vo.rs

Fargo: The Coens' Snowbound Morality Play