Daily Staff Writer

“Raising Arizona”

Many people will tell you their first Coen brothers experience was “Raising Arizona.” It was a big cable hit in the mid-’80s and it was easily accessible since it was about hicks.

The film stars Nicholas Cage (“Leaving Las Vegas,” “Fast Times at Ridgemont High”) as H.I. (Hi) MacDonough. Hi, being descended from a long line of frontiersman and outdoorsman types is a rambunctious multiple felon. Edwina (Ed) played by Holly Hunter (“The Piano,””Broadcast News”) is the cop who takes Hi’s mugshots time after time. The two fall in love and after Hi promises to become a changed man, the two get married.

Hi and Ed soon find out they cannot have children because Ed’s insides are “a rocky place” where Hi’s “seed could find no purchase.” Hopelessness sets in, the salad days pass and it looks as if the two will remain childless.

Then one day the Arizona quints are born to Nathan and Florence Arizona. Nathan is the proprietor of Unpainted Arizona, an unpainted furniture outlet with stores throughout the Southwest. Hi and Ed get the idea that the Arizonas have more than they can handle and plan to kidnap one of the tots.

All of this takes place in the first ten minutes of the film through a montage of scenes highlighted by a yodeled version of the Ode to Joy.

What follows can be described as a celebration as well as a mockery of hayseed life. Hi and Ed manage to kidnap young Nathan Jr. and bring him back to their trailor. Everything seems fine until a couple of Hi’s old prison buddies played by John Goodman (“Mother Night,” “King Ralph”) and William Forsythe (“The Rock,” “Once Upon a Time in America”) start asking tough questions like “what’s your baby’s name?”

After a family outing turns sour, the pressure of family life takes its toll on Hi, who goes back to his old ways and tries to rob a convenience store.

From there the plot revolves around a second kidnapping and a realization by Hi and Ed that they should give the baby back and break up.

The film is highlighted by one of the only fight scenes ever shot inside of a trailor home.

“Raising Arizona” is the Coen brothers at their comedic best. They go for the laughs in this film as they do in no other. The film seems like a simple mockery of rednecks, but it is more complex than that. It is a comedy about good and evil, life and love that will stick with you for years.

-Greg Jerrett

“The Hudsucker Proxy”

Even after the enormous success of “Fargo,” many people still pass up this Coen brothers gem.

“The Hudsucker Proxy” is the story of Norville Barnes (Tim Robbins: “The Shawshank Redemption,” “Bull Durham”), a simple man with big aspirations. Norville works in the mailroom of the Hudsucker Corporation, a giant mega-business. Although he has plans to work his way up in the company, most people consider Norville to be an idiot.

After Waring Hudsucker (Charles Durning: “Evening Shade,” “V.I. Warshawski”) commits suicide, board chairman Sidney J. Mussburger (Paul Newman: “The Sting”, “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”) takes control of the company.

Mussburger wants to serve his financial interests by running the company into the ground. He looks for the most incompetent person he can find to become the new president and settles on Barnes.

When Barnes becomes president, he begins work on his biggest idea, which consists of a piece of paper with a circle drawn on it. “You know, for kids?”

Barnes’ circle turns out to be the hula-hoop, and rather than driving the company into the ground, he is bringing windfall profits.

A local newspaper wants to get the biggest scoop on Barnes, who is now the toast of the town. The Chief (John Mahoney: “Say Anything,” “Moonstruck”), assigns his crack reporter Amy Archer (Jennifer Jason Leigh: “Fast Times at Ridgemont High”) to get close to Barnes. Although she too thinks him an idiot at first, Archer is eventually drawn in by Barnes simple charm.

What sets “The Hudsucker Proxy” apart as possibly the best of the Coen brothers films is the incredible sense of style with which they have infused it. They have created a cartoon-like world that is a lot like the world we know, but not quite the same.

The Coen’s subtle use of the bizzare is also in full effect. Two custodians in the building constantly do battle, representing the forces of good and evil.

In the end, “The Hudsucker Proxy” is a hilarious comedy, and an engaging world all its own.

-Ben Godar

“Miller’s Crossing”

“Miller’s Crossing” is a highly stylized gangster film. It has many of the atmospheric elements fans enjoyed in “Fargo” and “Barton Fink.” “Miller’s Crossing” is perched somewhere between these two, not attempting to be as funny as “Fargo” or as deeply disturbing and dark as “Barton Fink.”

“Miller’s Crossing” tells the story of Tom Reagan, played by Gabriel Byrne (“The Usual Suspects,” “Cool World”). He is the right hand man of Irish gangster Leo O’Bannion played by Albert Finney (“Annie,” “The Wolfen”). He is torn in several directions trying to stop a gang war from breaking out while he is having an affair with the boss’s wife, who wants him to help her bookie brother who is cheating the boss while attempting to pay his own debts.

He strikes a deal but cannot go through with the killing of his girlfriend’s brother. The bookie brother decides to blackmail Tom, who just saved his life.

The plot of “Miller’s Crossing” is a pastiche of standard gangster film plots, but the Coens’ personal touches make it a step above. Their ability to convincingly recreate this world of 1930s gangsters is flawless and highly stylized. A difficult trick to pull off without looking as cheesy as “Johnny Dangerously” or “Harlem Nights.”

“Miller’s Crossing” is a skewed morality play which examines the code of ethics in the world of prohibition-era gangs.

Gabriel Byrne gives a compelling performance as Tom Reagan. He is compelling without trying to engage our sympathy. He is a tough and nearly impenetrable archetype, but we sense a strain of decency particular to his world.

We never know exactly where this film is set and that adds to the element of fantasy which makes the film more of an idealized version of gangsters than just a simple story about criminals.

-Greg Jerrett