Low Price A Serious Man

Usually I dislike lazy comedies, over-hyped albatrosses like Avatar, and vehicles for the most over-rated actress of our generation, Renee Zellweger. But occasionally, I dislike the critics' beloved sacred cows that may appeal to the intellect, but are, in the viewing, so unenjoyable an experience as to be nearly unwatchable. And I think this perfectly describes A Serious Man. I did like films like Adaptation and I Heart Huckabees, which nearly fall into this category but are enjoyable to watch, and thus leave one interested and engaged with the difficult themes. After slogging through A Serious Man, I just turned it off and said, "Well, that was obnoxious." The film presents themes (accepting life vs. fighting it; absurdity, the lack of easy answers; and, bizarrely, the undead -- the Jewish dybbuk) but seems to have nothing to say about them (the dybbuk is introduced in the 10-minute non-sequitur first scene which takes place in Medieval Poland, but is not referred to again).

I'm not sure what the appeal of the characters is. Almost every character, major and minor, is portrayed as annoying, neurotic, ugly, whiny, frail, obnoxious. The film goes out of its way to portray its Jewish cast this way, gratuitously. In one scene, for example, the protagonist is getting advice from his sister (I think), who only appears sitting on a park bench in this single scene and is shown, inexplicably, to have braces on her legs -- because God forbid she just be a normal person! You might disagree that the film is anti-Semitic, but I think that the only reason you could make that argument is because the Coen Bros themselves are Jewish. If it's not anti-Semitic, then it seems designed to make the viewer come away feeling sickeningly like an anti-Semite.

A lot of people are going to heap praise on this movie, but it's just another arthouse-type film that only sounds good on paper. I give it two stars because it's obviously well-made, because the Coen Bros are artists even when they suck, and because utter distaste for a movie is a better reaction to have than not caring at all. At least there was something there to talk about, even if it didn't actually say anything.Get more detail about A Serious Man.