Coen brothers
30 Oct 2021 - 01 Apr 2025
- nihilism is a common presence in Coen bros movies – implicitly and occasionally explicitly, sometimes defining the mood of the film and sometimes as a sort of comedic or antagonistic presence.
- A Serious Man (very explicit)
- No Country for Old Men (Chigurh as a representation of the force of nihilism – "I got here the same way the coin did".)
- The Big Lebowski (even more explicit – one of the antagonists is a gang of actual nihilists), and it produces one of the greatest lines in movie history.
- Fargo (after a bleak comedy of nihilistic violence, the Frances McDormund character puts it all in its place – although she also says she doesn't understand it)
- Burn After Reading
- Hudsucker Proxy
- Raising Arizona (the vision of the biker)
- Further reading
- The Coen Brothers: This book Really Ties the Films Together, Alan Nayman