Fargo

The Coen brothers are one of the most prolific movie-making duos in cinema history, responsible for numerous critically acclaimed films such as Blood Simple, Miller's Crossing, Barton Fink and the 2007 Academy Award Best Picture winner No Country For Old Men, as well as many others. But in 1996 they released what many consider to be their finest work, the dark comedy/crime thriller Fargo. It was my introduction to the Coen brothers' work, and to this day it is still one of my favourite movies.

The movie revolves around a car salesman from Minnesota, Jerry Lundegaard (William H. Macy), who is buried under mountains of debt. To appease his financial worries, he hires 2 thugs Carl & Gaear (Steve Buscemi & Peter Stormare respectively) to kidnap his wife so he can collect the ransom money from his wealthy father-in-law Wade (Harve Presnell). Sounds simple right? Well, as we've seen time and time again, it takes a pair like the Coen bothers to make a seemingly straightforward plan so wonderfully complex.

The movie opens with Jerry driving to Fargo, North Dakota to meet Carl & Gaear. They agree to receive $40,000 and a new car in return for kidnapping Jerry's wife. While they attempt to kidnap her, we see Jerry go through several other methods of illicitly obtaining money such as obtaining loans for cars at his dealership with erroneous details, and promoting a real estate deal with Wade and keeping the principal for himself.

Meanwhile, Carl & Gaear kidnap Jean, and as they are heading through Brainerd, Minnesota to their safe house, they are pulled over by a state trooper because of their licence plates. But when bribing him fails, Gaear shoots him, and then 2 people who drove by and witnessed the killing. This incident gets the attention of Marge Gunderson (An Oscar winning performance by Frances McDormand), a polite, intelligent and heavily pregnant Police Chief. Throughout the film, she begins to put together the pieces of the puzzle, quizzing Jerry, Shep (the man who introduced Jerry to Carl and Gaear) and 2 hookers that 'encountered' the kidnappers.

As she is busy solving the crime, we see Jerry's blood pressure slowly soaring, and the 2 comically mismatched crooks trying to cope with their situation. The end result: absolute hilarity.

This film is first class. It has so much going for it that it's difficult to know where to start. The plot is well constructed and beautifully intricate, the characters are a diverse mix of conventional, unusual and downright outlandish.The Oscar-winning dialogue is funny, witting, and always entertaining, and the acting is just what you would expect from a Coen brother movies. One of their finest accomplishments, and a film I never get tired of no matter how many times I watch it.