Hail Caesar

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  • Hail Caesar

    drama, since the days of the Greeks, has been represented by the dueling masks of comedy and tragedy the latest Coen Bros. film works well as the former and as a companion piece to the latter's Barton Fink.

    set at the same fictional Hollywood studio as "Fink," Capitol Pictures, and ten years after the events of that story, filmmaking in Hail Caesar is heavenly where Barton Fink followed that writer's descent into hell. the title here refers to Capitol's big-budget biblical epic (subtitled "A Tale of the Christ"). Capitol's head of physical production, Eddie Mannix, himself plays God while trying to rescue the picture's main star (Clooney) who has been kidnapped by communist writers for ransom.

    as in other Coen kidnapping stories (Big Lebowski, Fargo), the plot itself is almost incidental to the events swirling around the players. has anyone ever actually gotten away with the ransom money in any of their films? I don't recall but maybe it happened once.

    Mannix's attempts to ensure that the Christ depicted in Hail Caesar as non-denominational and acceptable to all faiths, contrasted with the writers' indoctrination of Clooney's character into Marx's theory of capitalism, raise interesting questions about the eternal "commerce v. art" debate, although not on the existential level as in Barton Fink. and the Coens' have a lot of fun playing in the genre sandboxes of the WWII-era studio system -- oaters, chamber dramas, Esther Williams, and the bloated, turgid epics that Hollywood rushed out in reaction to the explosion of television.

    not quite top-tier Coens but a fun diversion, especially for writers who want to be part of what's left of that world today

  • #2
    Re: Hail Caesar

    This was a blast. I saw it twice over the weekend. Go see it and enjoy it for what it is... pure entertainment.
    “Nothing is what rocks dream about” ― Aristotle

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    • #3
      Re: Hail Caesar

      Channing Tatum was the highlight, IMO. Thoroughly enjoyable.

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      • #4
        Re: Hail Caesar

        Loved it. And CT showed great range in this (impressive), even if it was only meant as a spoof. I predict this will open new opportunities for him.

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        • #5
          Re: Hail Caesar

          --- Slightly spoilish ---


          I loved the soundstage and on-location production scenes, especially the sailor song and dance with Channing. Absolutely terrific. The 'ecumenical' table discussion about the Hail, Caesar script was also fun.

          Overall, though, the movie felt a little flat to me. I kept expecting and wanting it to take off into an increasingly intense studio-vs-kidnappers, cat-mouse, screwball frantic affair, but it didn't. The deliberately pompous narration was also too annoying and unsubtle to be effective as satire. Final Brolin-Clooney scene was effective, even shocking, but tonally at odds with everything that preceded it. In that scene the movie seemed to condone the anti-commie hysteria that I thought it was skewering earlier.

          Movie was very watchable and entertaining, but it was more a collection of scenes--some very enjoyable, others less so--than a good story (as JoeBanks indicated).

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          • #6
            Re: Hail Caesar

            One wonders if there's more to this movie than met the screen. I hope so... outtakes are always fun (I'd hoped to see those at credits' roll) and deleted scenes are always fun to imagine reinserted. I'm satisfied with it as it stands.
            “Nothing is what rocks dream about” ― Aristotle

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            • #7
              Re: Hail Caesar

              I'm surprised about the lovefest that's going on here for "Hail Caesar." Overall, I didn't like it. I was very unsatisfied.

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              • #8
                Re: Hail Caesar

                Regarding flatness, the throughline was clear (Mannix and theme), but because of the film's episodic nature, better transitions might have helped cohesiveness and momentum, IMO. That, and some things didn't really fit.

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                • #9
                  Re: Hail Caesar

                  http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/t...ers_movie.html

                  there are plenty of other kidnapping movies out there that have perfectly-constructed plots and twists and turns and whatever else kidnapping movies are supposed to have, i guess.

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                  • #10
                    Re: Hail Caesar

                    It was definitely billed as a madcap, "studio exec enlists high-strung stars to help save his kidnapped star" story, when in fact it's more a picaresque "day in the life of a post-war studio exec" story. So I did have to adjust to some mismatched expectations early on, which didn't help. But once I relaxed into it and just decided to follow along wherever it went, I thought it was pretty fun.

                    And again, there's Channing Tatum dancing and hamming it up, which is straight-up delightful. That guy is just a constant surprise lately, I feel like.

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                    • #11
                      Re: Hail Caesar

                      Just saw it - I feel pretty similarly to donreel.

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                      • #12
                        Re: Hail Caesar

                        It's too bad it hasn't done better at the box office. I thought it was great, but then, I thought Shawshank Redemption was great, too.
                        “Nothing is what rocks dream about” ― Aristotle

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                        • #13
                          Re: Hail Caesar

                          Originally posted by TigerFang View Post
                          It's too bad it hasn't done better at the box office. I thought it was great, but then, I thought Shawshank Redemption was great, too.
                          Is it doing badly?

                          The production budget on it was only something like $22m. I suspect they spent a lot to market it, and can't claim to be an expert on the finances of movies like that, but I doubt $11m opening weekend is worse than "minor disappointment," if that.

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                          • #14
                            Re: Hail Caesar

                            THR and Variety will report anything that isn't a gigantic box office smash as lukewarm or disappointing, so it's hard to tell how it's really doing against expectations/budget.

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                            • #15
                              Re: Hail Caesar

                              I saw it and enjoyed individual scenes, but didn't think it was that good as a whole.

                              A few things that come to mind:
                              + The religious discussion
                              + "It's complicated"
                              + Final Whitlock scene delivering speech. Good stuff.

                              - Mannix's reason to go with Lockheed's ridiculously generous offer should've been stronger than a priest saying "What does your heart tell you?"
                              - Why did Mannix tell Hobie about Whitlock's kidnapping
                              - Why did we go through the scene with the editor woman and her scarf? The only thing it delivered was Hobie's "It's complicated" line.
                              - What came of Hobie's and Carlotta's relationship?
                              - The whole DeeAnna Moran / Joe Silverman thing handled off-screen in the end.
                              - Nobody diving in to grab the semi-floating suitcase with $100k in it?

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