Sunday, July 14, 2013

Miller's Crossing - The Coen Brothers

Seen for the the tenth time in July 2013.

I went a good decade-long stretch of not watching this movie after having seen it for the first time at some point in the mid-nineties. I had seen it too many times and thought that I didn't think it was that good. Over the last couple of years, however, I've come to realize it is the Coens's masterpiece.

My theory of the movie is basically that Gabriel Byrne's character Tom has an unrequited homosexual love for his boss Leo. This is more or less why he sleeps with Verna, Leo's lover, despite his disregard for her. It is the closest he can come to consummating his love for Leo; by sleeping with the woman that Leo is sleeping with. Tom does not take a single action in this movie that is inconsistent with this motivation, including the instances where Tom acts more like a spurned lover than an intelligent, ruthlessly logical man "playing the angles."

In addition, some overt support for this theory occurs with Leo's exasperated line early in the movie while still arguing over whether or not to turn Turturro's Bernie over to Casper "the kid is as bad a twist." Leo is referring to Tom as a woman with this line and specifically he is referring to Tom's stubborn emotions which arise to him not getting his way. This subtle feminization of Tom is in line in popular understanding with a suggestion of latent homosexuality. Also the final scene between Tom and Leo plays like the end of a romantic relationship more than a professional criminal one, again with Tom playing the part of the spurned woman, and Leo the heartbroken male role.

The great debate surrounding this movie is whether or not Tom has a heart. I am in the camp of seeing Tom as essentially heartless. He's ruthless and intelligent, unswayed by sentiment or notions of ethics but unwaveringly loyal to Leo, wanting to see Leo happy, even after he's determined that they must part ways. And if this is true, it leaves me wondering, after all these years, just why he choses to let Bernie live the first time he is in position to shoot him. After all, his machinations do not depend on Bernie living. In fact, he did not and could not have anticipated being thrust in the role of Bernie's assassin.

So why if he is so ruthless and heartless, does he let Bernie go free. Is it that he has never killed anyone before and has a moment of weakness or are we to believe that this was part of his plan all along or is it simply that he didn't feel as though he needed to kill Bernie and so that was enough for him not to. I do not believe it is due to any attachment he felt toward Bernie's sister Verna who Tom uses and clearly has no real affection for. Tom's motivation in this scene, and it's one of cinema's historically great scenes, can be debated at length. It is itself one of the great enigmas of cinematic history. Turturro's gives what has to be historically one of the best performances by any actor, on par with Dustin Hoffman in Urban Cowboy, in terms of nuance and range. Truly exceptional.

Grade A.

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