I've never run into a Coen Brothers movie I didn't like. Their skewed way of looking at the world and placing oddball characters into their stories appeals to me tremendously. This film may not win over fans of traditional Westerns like "True Grit", which the Coens took a crack at almost a decade ago with favorable results. Their anthology approach here is designed to introduce a diverse assortment of tales with only one common element running through all of them - each one produces a dead body! A couple of the deaths don't actually occur on screen, but are offered in ironic juxtaposition to the story in which they took place. Because of the widely (and wildly) diverse nature of the tales, it's kind of difficult to pick out a favorite, if in fact the word 'favorite' even applies.
Each of the chapters in the movie comes with it's own title and introduction, and it starts out on a most favorable note with the appearance of Buster Scruggs (Tim Blake Nelson) astride his white horse Dan. He evokes the memory of Gene Autry in countless B Westerns of the Forties and Fifties, coming on the scene while strumming his guitar and singing an upbeat tune. Of all the little episodes, this is the one that plays most as a caricature of the Western genre, and it contains an element I've never seen in over seven or eight hundred Westerns - it has Buster's nemesis, The Frenchman (David Krumholtz) mount his horse from the right side! Seriously, no one EVER mounts a horse from the right side, and I had to wonder if the Coens' goofing with the audience included this little tidbit intentionally.
I'm not going to discuss each of the vignettes offered in the film, or attempt to pick a favorite, because none of them really lend themselves to being particularly likeable in the sense that their resolutions end favorably for the participants. Especially gruesome were the fates of the Artist (Harry Melling) in the segment titled 'Meal Ticket', and that of poor Alice Longabaugh (Zoe Kazan) in 'The Gal Who Got Rattled'. In your traditional Westerns, you'd never have a character like The Artist, and the fate of an Alice Longabaugh would have been anathema for the likes of John Ford or Howard Hawks.
The only story I didn't particularly understand upon a first viewing was the final one called 'The Mortal Remains'. It ends somewhat humorously, but everything leading up to it is mere conversation among stagecoach riders in somewhat antagonistic fashion. I'll have to go back to that one to see if there's something I missed. But overall, I got the biggest kick out of this off beat Western in a way I haven't experienced since 1995's "The Quick and the Dead". Chances are if you liked that one, you'll like this one too, but of course, the opposite could be just as true as well.
Each of the chapters in the movie comes with it's own title and introduction, and it starts out on a most favorable note with the appearance of Buster Scruggs (Tim Blake Nelson) astride his white horse Dan. He evokes the memory of Gene Autry in countless B Westerns of the Forties and Fifties, coming on the scene while strumming his guitar and singing an upbeat tune. Of all the little episodes, this is the one that plays most as a caricature of the Western genre, and it contains an element I've never seen in over seven or eight hundred Westerns - it has Buster's nemesis, The Frenchman (David Krumholtz) mount his horse from the right side! Seriously, no one EVER mounts a horse from the right side, and I had to wonder if the Coens' goofing with the audience included this little tidbit intentionally.
I'm not going to discuss each of the vignettes offered in the film, or attempt to pick a favorite, because none of them really lend themselves to being particularly likeable in the sense that their resolutions end favorably for the participants. Especially gruesome were the fates of the Artist (Harry Melling) in the segment titled 'Meal Ticket', and that of poor Alice Longabaugh (Zoe Kazan) in 'The Gal Who Got Rattled'. In your traditional Westerns, you'd never have a character like The Artist, and the fate of an Alice Longabaugh would have been anathema for the likes of John Ford or Howard Hawks.
The only story I didn't particularly understand upon a first viewing was the final one called 'The Mortal Remains'. It ends somewhat humorously, but everything leading up to it is mere conversation among stagecoach riders in somewhat antagonistic fashion. I'll have to go back to that one to see if there's something I missed. But overall, I got the biggest kick out of this off beat Western in a way I haven't experienced since 1995's "The Quick and the Dead". Chances are if you liked that one, you'll like this one too, but of course, the opposite could be just as true as well.