I love this movie so much

Very best movie i ever watch

Boring

Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,

So I just watched The man who wasn't there, a noir movie from the Coens brothers, which won them the 2001 Cannes for best director (tied with David Lynch's Muholland Drive). And oh boy, I love and hate this movie at the same time.The movie can break out into first half and the second half. While the first half setups the plot and introducing characters, the second half is much faster and hits me with lots of thoughts.The movie starts out with the life of Ed Crane, a barber in 1949 America. Leading a sad boring life, Ed doesn't seem to feel or react to anything in his life. He didn't married out of love, and his wife doesn't care about him, even though she may say she does. He can tell she's having an affair with her boss/his friend Big Dave. One day he met a pansy who lured him into investing in dry-cleaning business. At once glance anyone can see this is a scam or it will fail, but Ed buys it. Probably he wanted a chance to escape his boring barber life. So he blackmailed Big Dave the affair to give the pansy the money. This was later found out by Big Dave. Ed was called to this shop by Big Dave to "solve" this problem, but ended up killing him in a self-defense act. This is the first half of the movie. My main thought until this point, especially after Ed and his wife went to a party to meet people they don't like, is that adult life is like a box, you can't escape and do what you want all the time. Things speed up in the second half of the movie. As the plot moves forward, my head was filled with thoughts about life. The movie is in black and while, and uses some Beethoven's best sonatas, setting its tone into sadness, I half feel sorry but half not for Ed, or what he's going through. This movie with all these "random" things happen, reminds me of another Coens' movie "A serious man". While its philosophy is: life has no meaning, nothing we do ever matter. Not until the middle of the movie, i realised this is a tragic- comedy. I didn't laughed at all about what happen (except sometimes the joke was too obvious),I just feel sad as things keep happening throughout the movie. *This part contains spoilers for the ending* Slowly he lost everything, his wife, his money, his store, and he lived like a ghost. There was this scene right after the accident. It was about Ed and his wife having a normal life, I viewed it as Ed's best moment of his life. At the end, he got arrested for murder, not for Big Dave but for the pansy Big Dave found out and killed. I think he accepted it like a punishment to himself for killing Big Dave. He got the chair. After all the sadness, I think this is the happy ending we got. Ed, like me, didn't understand how all this happened. Sure we know it steps by steps, but we couldn't see any pattern. Maybe he truly have no place in this world. He's *The man who wasn't there*, he's good as dead.

Set in the late 1940's, low key barber Ed Crane (Billy Bob Thorton) inadvertently blackmails his wife's boss, which leads to him killing him to cover it up. This triggers a complicated police involvement with Ed, as well as a psychological breakdown, all while he narrates the events in his mind.Billy Bob Thorton is not only greatly cast, but he is top notch in this film, you feel what he feels, and what he's going through not just through the narration, but through his facial expressions. The Coens captured the psychological feeling through the excellent cinematography, eerie music, and classy set pieces. The events in the film are fairly simple and play out like a pretty standard neo- noir drama, but his narration is what makes it so deep and unforgettable, and what makes it stand out. This is a rare instance where it isn't style over substance, both are very strong in this film. We get the classy black and white cinematography, along with some strong character reading.I had a couple issues. Like I said, it is a standard neo noir film, and the narration kind of over escalates the film itself, and doesn't play out on its own at any point. It also takes a bit of time to set up the plot, and even though it has great payoff, it's still rough to get through. Overall, it's a super solid Coen film that stands out as one of their more psychological films, as well as one of their most stylistic.

The Coen Brothers don't make bad original films, some of them are not as strong as others, but they all have well crafted interesting scripts, usually involving someone ordinary getting themselves involved in something criminal, usually with devastating results and some macabre humour just to keep things relatable.The Man Who Wasn't There is a great film, beautifully shot with every frame being meticulously crafted and iconic. Ed the Barber utters few words throughout the entire film yet he steals every scene with his 50s style film star stares and constant smoking. The smoke is one of the best actors in the whole thing, adding layers of movement to every black and white frame.The plot does get a little predictable at times, but this doesn't detract from a solid interesting piece of cinema, and the whole thing is peppered with Coen Brother traits which make it a must see for any fan of their work, and maybe even a good place to start for any Coen virgins.This is one that does improve with subsequent viewings, but might be a little slow paced for someone looking for more popcorn drama, there are some tense moments, but overall this is a character study through a 50s noir pallet.Worth a watch

Ed Crane (Billy Bob Thornton) is a barber working at his in laws' barber shop. He's relatively unhappy with his life and suspects that his wife Doris Crane (Frances McDormand) is having an affair with her boss Big Dave Brewster (James Gandolfini). Ed gets talking to one of his customers who offers him a stake in his dry cleaning business if Ed stumps up $10,000. Ed doesn't have the money, but hatches a plan to get the money. However, Ed quickly learns that his simple and seemingly flawless plan ends up having far reaching consequences.I know that the Coen Brothers have a die hard cult following of fans, but I've never really been one of them. In fact, I've actually disliked nearly all of their films that I've seen. However, this film is different - this film really impressed me.This film is basically a Cautionary Tale - the Coen Brothers have actually made their audience consider the devastating consequences resulting in being greedy. They also make the audience consider the devastating consequences that one poorly judged action can have on many different people.The Coen Brothers have also created many characters that are not only well developed, but that we can also identify with. Ed Crane is probably the best example; for me he's an idealist, someone who wants to be recognised and remembered, someone who wants to be somebody. This becomes more apparent when he meets Birdy Abunbdas (Scarlett Johansson). Birdy becomes his project or possibly even his redemption. What I liked about Ed is that he was a flawed person rather than a bad person which meant that it was easier to relate to and care for his character. Birdy was an interesting character and it was a shame that her character wasn't developed quite as much as I hoped for - there was a lot of potential with her character which the Coen brothers didn't explore for some reason.I'll admit that in the early stages of this film that I thought the narrative was a bit shaky and found it a bit nonsensical, but as the film progressed I found myself more and more engrossed and thought that everything ended up being tied together nicely. As mentioned. it's a Cautionary Tale and is a film that will certainly make you think.The film is well-shot and the 1940's era has been captured well. Acting was roundly good across the board with Gandolfini and Coen brothers favourite McDormand arguably putting in the best performances.Overall then this is a very good film (and that's coming from someone who isn't a big Coen brothers fan). I thought that the writing was sharp, the acting was good, the plot was interesting (after a bit of a plodding first half). This is a good piece of noir and a very good film in general. Highly recommended for fans of noir or fans of the Coen brothers.