Fargo

Fargo

1996

Director: Joel Coen

Writer: Joel and Ethan Coen

98 Minutes

Carl (Steve Buscemi) gets pulled over for no tags on his car. He tries to convince a Brainerd police officer to let him and his associate, Gaear (Peter Stormare) go with some cash hanging out of his wallet. They are denied. To make matters worse, in the backseat is Jean Lundgaard (Kristen Rudrud) who had been kidnapped from the Lundgaard home earlier that day. When the officer asks Carl to step out of the car, Gaear pulls a gun and shoots the police officer in the head.

That’s when shit got real. In the scene above, Carl’s face reveals shit getting real. And truly, shit is real.

Fargo became an instant classic, putting the Coen brother’s on the map with an Academy Award for Best Writing. These brothers would go onto win three more Academy Awards, thus far.

Fargo’s premise of “based on a true story” is not exactly true, but the Coen brothers did this to suspend disbelief in the story. In reality, this film is based on two cases. Case one is attorney Eugene Thompson who paid to have his wife killed, yet the crime was foiled by the stupidity of the hit men. Case two involved Virginia Piper whose husband paid a two million dollar ransom for and Mrs. Piper was later found tied to a tree in a state park.

Shit = real.

Back to the scene above, Carl and Gaear have a simple job: kidnapped a man’s wife. When they are pulled over and Gaear shoots the cop and then hunts down two witnesses, killing them in cold blood, all which brings heat in the form of the ever-talented Marge Gunderson (Frances McDormand)

This "beat" ups the ante in the story. This is no longer a smash and grab job. It’s smash, grab, and evade murder charges job. And this is particularly difficult with Marge Gunderson on the case.

But even she has her dark secrets. Even in her happiest times – her pregnancy – she goes on a date with another man. She never tells her husband and even though rejects Mike (Steve Park), it’s the only time she dresses up and fixes her hair.

This is a film of dark secrets in a bright place. It’s Brainerd, MN. It’s home to Babe the Blue Ox. It's home to mountains of white, pure snow. It’s a peaceful city with genuine people. And then shit got real.

In the end, Fargo explains what humanity is capable of in the hands of the fantastically stupid.

And then there’s the wood chipper.