'Inside Llewyn Davis,' the story of a troubled troubadour, is one of the Coen brothers' best
In top form, Joel and Ethan Coen offer up feel-bad experiences that, like fine blues medleys, make you feel good (although with an acidulous aftertaste). 鈥淚nside Llewyn Davis鈥� is one of their best. So many movies are emblazoned with happy faces; this one wears its sadness, and its snarl, proudly.
There is more to this film than the tinny nihilism that often mars the brothers鈥� movies. Set in 1961, when the folk-music scene was just beginning to morph into its early Bob Dylan phase, it鈥檚 about a week in the life of Llewyn Davis (Oscar Isaac, in a career-making performance), a troubadour whose heartfelt first solo album has fallen on mostly deaf ears.
Llewyn 鈥� the name is Welsh 鈥� was in a moderately successful duo until his partner jumped off the George Washington Bridge. Now he spends his nights sleeping on the couches of friends from the Upper West Side to Greenwich Village, toting his guitar as well as an orange tabby named Ulysses that escaped from one of the apartments he crashed in. It鈥檚 wintertime and Llewyn can鈥檛 even afford a heavy coat.
He has the sloe-eyed look of a famished, bearded apostle 鈥� he could have stepped out of an El Greco canvas. (Isaac, who grew up in Miami, has a Guatamalan-Cuban lineage.) Despite the hardships 鈥� the two-bit recording gigs, the lukewarm sets at the Village鈥檚 Gaslight Caf茅, the going-nowhere tryouts 鈥� Llewyn is no figure of pathos. He鈥檚 too ornery for that. He may not have much of a life, but he manages to disrupt the lives of everybody around him.
Jean (Carey Mulligan), for example, is one half of a clean-cut folkie duo with her husband, Jim (Justin Timberlake), who is also a good friend of Llewyn鈥檚. Llewyn has nevertheless impregnated Jean, and her vituperation with him cuts right through her stage-managed cheeriness. Already cash-strapped, he now must pay for her abortion.
Why should we care about Llewyn? It鈥檚 a fair question, and there indeed were times when I thought I was trapped inside a generic Coen Brothers drearathon. What lifts the film out of the usual glum rut is that Llewyn, for all his self-regarding annoyingness, is a genuine talent. He exhibits the true artist鈥檚 alchemy: When he鈥檚 performing, all his nonsense burns away and what you get is pure, proud, deep-toned feeling. (The marvelous soundtrack of songs, some standards, some new, was produced by T Bone Burnett.) Only as an artist is he fully realized, and so his failure to connect with audiences and booking agents isn鈥檛 just a professional loss, it鈥檚 a personal tragedy.
The Coens created a Job-like character in 鈥�A Serious Man,鈥� a luckless professor for whom nothing could go right. There was an element of cruelty in that film, like watching someone being dismembered slowly, limb by limb, but the ghastliness of the man鈥檚 predicament was so horrible it was funny 鈥� a black comic kvell. Llewyn鈥檚 fate is more of a slow-burn slide into despair, a despair he never fully allows himself to indulge.
The Coens don鈥檛 fully allow us to indulge it, either. That鈥檚 all for the best, I think, and not just because otherwise the film might be too much to bear. They don鈥檛 get all slobby-soppy with us, and so the moments of poignancy in this film, of which there are many, come through without any special pleading. When Llewyn sings Ewan MacColl鈥檚 tender 鈥淭he Shoals of Herring鈥� to his infirm, uncomprehending ex-Merchant Marine father in a nursing home, the brief sequence has a plaintive grace.
Llewyn鈥檚 working-class background 鈥� he also has toiled as a merchant mariner 鈥� sets him somewhat apart from the other folkies that we see. It gives his grit a pedigree. There鈥檚 some class condescension in how he reacts to those who are better off than he. His response to the kindly wife of a Columbia professor who exclaims, 鈥淚 thought singing was a joyous expression of the soul,鈥� is a hard-bitten disbelief. That鈥檚 his pose, but it鈥檚 also how he copes in an unabiding world. Bitterness is his armature.
The people in this movie are writhing in various states of turmoil, but they have an avidity for their own misery. Roland Turner (marvelously played by John Goodman), the big, bleary New Orleans bluesman with whom Llewyn shares a disastrous ride to Chicago, is a Falstaffian sleazeball. The great F. Murray Abraham鈥檚 poker-faced artist鈥檚 manager Bud Grossman is not so much miserable as he is the cause of misery in others. After listening to Llewyn pour his heart out in an audition, he fills the slow silence by matter-of-factly stating, 鈥淚 don鈥檛 see a lot of money here.鈥�
The losses for Llewyn pile up, but he never quite resigns himself to his predicament. He never lets go. But we can see what he can鈥檛 鈥� the folkie revolution that will usher in his kind of music. Is his an impending happy ending or a final forlorn put-down by the fates? The story closes on a rich and necessary ambiguity. Grade: A- (Rated R for language including some sexual references.)
