What Are You Watching?
A podcast for people who LOVE movies. Filmmakers/best friends, Alex Withrow and Nick Dostal, do their part to keep film alive. Thanks for listening, and happy watching!
What Are You Watching?
191: Fargo (1996)
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Blood has been shed! Alex and Nick break down a modern American masterpiece, Joel and Ethan Coen’s “Fargo.” Topics include theorizing why Jerry Lundegaard needs money, Shep and Carl’s relationship, the geographical distance between Fargo and Minneapolis, Scotty’s fate, the great Harve Presnell as Wade, Carter Burwell’s perfect score, Roger Deakins’ cinematography, and the ingenious decision to include scenes with Mike Yanagita and Mr. Mohra.
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Hey everyone, it's Alex sharing an exciting update. Visit WAYW Podcast to write to us, donate, buy our brand new merch, and join our Patreon. What are you watching? Bonus features is available at Patreon.com slash WAYW. That's where you'll find uncut episodes, including a larger version of this Fargo episode, fan pick deep dives, reviews of new movies, and more. Head to patreon.com slash WAYW for what are you watching bonus features. Now to the show. Hey everyone, welcome to What Are You Watching? I'm Alex Swithrow and I'm joined by my best man, Nick Dostal. How's the frecassy there, Norm son of a Gunderson? Oh yeah, it's real good over here.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh, the painting's turning real good.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, I got the three cents stamp there. Oh yeah. Oh, sure they do. Sure they do. People did such a good audience. People use it all the time. They get the new ones and they have to make up for the old ones. They use them all the time. You're the best Margie. That was our Fargo episode. See you later, brother. There you go. Listening and happy watching. That was the final scene. Ah man, Fargo. Joel and Ethan Cohen's Fargo. We did the we did uh Cohen Brothers' main feed episode that was very long. Thanks everyone for listening. Yes, it was. We did Patreon Cohen Brothers Oscars, where I actually teased something that I'm going to talk about in depth today on this episode. And now we're breaking it out for a main feed Fargo deep dive. And I am excited. This is one of my favorite movies ever. I've seen it so many damn times. How do you feel to be here? Oh, I'm very excited.
SPEAKER_00Very happy to be here. Um, yeah, no, this is uh, you know, we're following the pattern of these big directors that we do, and we kind of select one movie from that filmography to really go in on. There really isn't a better movie to do this with for the Coens than this. I mean, we could have had fun, we could have been cute. This is like one of those episodes where we get to kind of really talk about why this movie is as good as it is. There, they're really this is this is as about as an important of a movie from the decade of the 90s to any filmmaker out there that wants to study film. And it's all so simple. This movie could not be a simpler study in in how to actually make a movie.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, well said. I mean, $7 million in the mid-90s. This was there weren't too many movies like that. Then one usually broke through every year. You know, the year before usual suspects leaving Las Vegas, that was big. Year before that, Pulp Fiction, Pulp Fiction kind of started this train in terms of these movies making a shitload of money and being nominated for and winning Oscars. The independent American film movement movement is here. Fargo is a great announcement of that. It's like, hey, here you go, these co-its, like you know, and when we went through their career, like we talked about how they had they got they were a con sensation for Barton Fink. Hudsucker proxy was not received well by critics or audiences, and then they go to the drawing board and they're like, hmm, we could probably use a hit, like crime thriller. That I mean, that's like the genesis of this, and then they write it and make it. And I, you know, we always start with kind of our relationship with the movie. Found this one very early, a VHS release. Like my parents and all of their friends saw it in the theater, so it's probably released on VHS like either late 1996 or early 1997. And they just I, you know, I was already allowed to watch whatever, but there's not like there's some crazy stuff. Uh I mean a little bit. The bad stuff that is in the movie did not offput my parents at all. Like, I had already watched watch reswar dogs with them. So, like a cop getting shot in the head, uh, you know, whatever. If I remember correctly, my mom wanted me to close my eyes with the 10-second, you know, Motel scene. And I was like, I was gonna say that's about it, yeah. Yeah, but then otherwise, it's a you know, so when it hit VHS, then it became an absolute sensation. Everyone watched it, everyone talked about it. The wood chipper was ubiquitous with American pop culture, it was just like everywhere, everyone knew what the wood chipper was, and then this is when you really had in real time the Cohen brothers becoming for good the Cohen brothers. This is when they're you know, we all know their name because of Fargo and what happened after. They had amazing films before, you know, some really good films, but this is like nah, we can do our weird shit, and Fargo is a weird little movie, like we could do our weird shit, but it can also cross over and make it so everyone's talking about it and we're gonna win Oscars. So I've been in love with this movie since it was released.
SPEAKER_00And it's hard to even kind of imagine, like, I like when you said I think it's true, but it was sort of like we could use a hit. Yeah, how could anyone possibly know that this was gonna be a hit?
SPEAKER_01Like, yeah, you couldn't. I think they just they were like, Okay, let's go to you know, kind of noir, let's do criminals, let's not set it in the past. Or they do, but they don't have to spend a lot of money, like you know, Hudsucker, Barton Fink, you know, the Miller's Crossing, these are all set in the past, and you gotta pay for that production quality. But yeah, let's just kind of set it here now, and then I mean, you know, we'll get into the movie, but they fuck with us right away with this true story claim.
SPEAKER_00Oh my god, it's the funniest thing. It's so funny, it's not a true story, it's just not a true story, it's not, but that went on for decades, it felt like maybe not decades, it's about maybe maybe at least 10 years.
SPEAKER_01In the moment, it took at least until we got into the new century. It and for my memory, for this to be officially debunked, they never talked about it. Yeah, and it, you know, now it could be debunked probably within like two days of it being released because of Reddit and shit. But back then it took a while, which is to say that when everyone saw this for the first time, you it's not that you thought it was a true story, you knew because the movie told you.
SPEAKER_00So we were all talking about it like it was a real crime, and and you know, and the thing is is that it plays like a real crime. Like that, I think that's part of this movie's charm, in a sense. I don't know if that's the right word. Oh, it's very charming. Oh, yeah, it is. But no, it is, but I think there's also a bit of if you were watching it for the first time and you did believe that this was a true story, it's so easy and like in a state of like wonder to kind of be like, oh my god, I can't believe this happened. I can't believe people are this stupid. People are actually that stupid. This is absolutely something that could very easily happen. And I think that's something that um a theme that Roger Deacons, I liked, talked about, which is a very small little theme that you wouldn't necessarily pick up. But, you know, we'll we'll get into it more. But like, how in any time that the Coans can see traffic in this movie, they wanted to see traffic as the idea that like this type of thing could be happening. Like, who's in that car driving right there? Anywhere, like, this is people come and go into these cities and pull shit like this. Even Jerry's office, you got all that traffic in the background.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you're absolutely right. They did all that on purpose.
SPEAKER_00There's a part of me that wishes I would never have found out that it was not based on a true story because I love the idea that it is. But it then at the same time, though, I'm really glad that I know this because it really does actually you can use this as a tool. Like you can actually make something yourself and make it so outrageous and ridiculous, and then say it's based on a true story, it's gonna add something to what you're making. You just make sure you get you do have to give it some space until like the dust is completely settled, there's no money to be made anymore. Be like, yeah, yeah, it's not it's not true.
SPEAKER_01I think one of the most annoying things is when like we get some you know important biopic and it says this is a true story in the beginning, and now because of the internet, within like a weekend, we go, No, this is largely bullshit. I'm not gonna go down the hit list of all these movies. There are so many of them. A lot of them have won Oscars in the past 10 years. I'm not gonna litigate it again. Here are two guys who are who are doing it because they think it's funny. Yeah, like that is why they did it. They did it why they did it, and yet if you went, I mean, Jesus, if I went now, it wouldn't, it would take me a day to think of all the true crime cases I've heard, and I could come up with an amalgamation where like all of this has happened, like in our life, all of it has happened. You could probably go back to the mid 80s and find stuff and put it all together, and maybe that's what they did. But the story, like as a whole, is not one cohesive thing. They may have taken, like, oh, someone killed someone with a wood chipper a few years ago. That's interesting, shit like that, and then you're just throwing it in the pot.
SPEAKER_00That's exactly what they did. Uh Deacon says that in in the in the commentary, you know, a basic Yeah, he does a commentary for it.
SPEAKER_01It's amazing. Yeah, I love it.
SPEAKER_00It's really good because it's just Deacon's solo, yeah. Yeah, just by himself. And he was sort of like, Yeah, these guys just took some stuff that has happened before in the past and and just sort of kind of with their story, kind of combines some things.
SPEAKER_01It was a huge cultural moment at the time. And then one of my favorite things to do with my wife is show her these movies. She had like heard of it but never seen it. This was years ago, and when that credit came up in the beginning, I just let it roll and I was like, Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, it's real. Oh, yeah. And then she loved it, not just because of that reason, but it was yet more confirmation to me that like someone if they missed it in '96 or missed it all the way up until you know the 2020s, it still hits and it still works, and it does. And the fact that this is usually always on some major streaming platform leads me to believe that it consistently does well. And I I think I really think we could recommend this to any Gen Z age person. They'd be like, that was awesome. That was really good. That's the thing about this movie.
SPEAKER_00This is one of those universal I mean, you don't necessarily have to like you know love it to the like to the point where it's your like favorite movie of all time, though it certainly is good enough to be that for somebody. But it is a universal movie where everyone can look at this and absolutely enjoy it. You really get it all here. And like, I love that we talked about this too. Is like you're in and you're out with this movie. This movie is like one hour and 39 minutes. Boom, boom, done.
SPEAKER_01And not even with credits, the opening credits are kind of long, and the end credits, so like you hack those out. You're talking like you're damn near at a flat 90, maybe like 92, and you are not missing anything. You feel like you have been extremely well taken care of, and probably maybe want to watch it again.
SPEAKER_00Well, that's the thing, is like it's so well paced that it doesn't feel like they're rushing, it doesn't feel like they're taking any time, they're just they're just doing their own thing, and they're just and it's running at the pace of the movie, and all it needs to be is this flat 90-minute deal, and it's so good because of that. That's something I don't think we would have talked about back in 1996. I think this has just got to be a 2026, a 30-year what what what has changed the most in movies is when you can go back and say, Don't you just miss when the use of movies were 90 minutes?
SPEAKER_01And if you would have asked me in '96, I never would have guessed that this art form would in general get longer. I never would have predicted that. I thought, like, maybe we're gonna strive to always hit like the hundred minute. Because when this like 98 minutes at the time was like normal, 100 minutes kind of became the thing. Two hours you go, okay. Yeah, that's a movie. Two and a half was the epic of the year, three and a half, it better be fucking Titanic. Let me tell you, like, it seriously better be if or Schindler's list, like it better be something like that. Now we just get, you know, superhero movies 235 without breaking a sweat. You're like, Jesus. Breaking a sweat. Not at all. You're they just walk off with it. Yeah, but again, I do that's what one thing that I think appeals to younger audiences today that they, yeah, you can still go back and it's like, wait, 90 minutes, that's like three episodes or an episode a half of you know a drama. And yeah, it's gonna cruise by and you're gonna like it.
SPEAKER_00And I'm excited to get into it. And what's we'll get into this too, but I bet you a lot, maybe outside of William H. Macy, but I bet you there would be a lot of younger people that might not exactly know this cast.
SPEAKER_01Oh, really? I was thinking Frances is pretty, pretty famous. She's gone on to win two more Oscars, like she's pretty well known.
SPEAKER_00Then I feel like everyone knows Boucemi, but maybe I'm maybe I'm well Boucemi's the one I was thinking of, but I mean Francis, yeah, she has done that, but I mean, is she exactly like really like outside of those two movies, those three movies? Like those are her big like widely famous ones. I don't know. I would I would bet you Francis is not on most people's radars if they're not really in the kind of know of things.
SPEAKER_01And like the movie no. I yeah, I don't know. But well, then either way, it's like you're gonna watch it, and whether you know the cast or not, you're gonna be really uh surprised, you're gonna laugh, you're gonna be scared, all that.
SPEAKER_00That's what I mean, is like this movie is so well cast, just characterization-wise, that it won't matter if you don't even know who any of these actors are because they all do such a good job at embodying what these characters need to be for the tone and for like the everything that this movie is. It it's just it's another reason why this is a almost note perfect movie. We'll get there.
SPEAKER_01We'll get there, get there, we'll get there very shortly in just a few minutes. I I do find it hard to believe that I think every single person watching this movie, like when Wade comes up, they're like, Harv Presnell. I know Harv Presnell, cool. That was a joke. Um, all right. So the the credits start, you know, true story, and which is again flatly not true. And then right away they're they're we're hearing this Carter Burwell score that is magnificent, a great tone setter, and we're seeing what Roger Deacons is gonna do with the look of the film, which, as you already have stated, is very simple, and that is something he is touching on constantly in the commentary. That, like, I that's why I love Deacons. I mean, he has his own podcast and he always talks about movies like this. His episode when he was talking about Jesse James, he's like, This was a tough movie. I don't think Andrew Dominic and I will work together again, and that's that's okay. That's okay. Like, it was a tough shoot, it was a tough movie. So he always gives it to you honest and clean. And he's like, Far, you know, the commentary, yeah, you know, we had some problems, but like it's fine. You just it's so easy. It just I don't know, it's just like, can we do this in one? Fine, yeah, we do it in one. And I I don't know if it was until this commentary that I would realize those winners that they're doing a lot in the movie, you know, just the lot the one-scene winners, but because the camera's moving and then still, and then when the conversation's done, it re readjusts. Yeah, it's just great cinematography all around, but we were getting hit with that right away.
SPEAKER_00And then one one really nice tidbit to know about that opening shot, too, is like that was actually that was Deacon's assistant that actually opening shot.
SPEAKER_01Because it never it would not snow when they were filming. They all most of the snow in the movie is fake, except this opening shot. They're like, We got snow, we got snow. It's the king's consistent.
SPEAKER_00That's one of the things that I'm gonna talk about a lot in this is that you know, when you're making a movie where it's so specifically designed to look a certain way, where you're gonna be shooting in North Dakota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, where snow shouldn't be a problem. You know, like you actually are giving yourself a bit of a layup because we're like, well, we want the movie to look this like a big whiteout everywhere we go because that's the area. And then when you come to actually shoot there and realize that you're getting blue skies, no snow. I mean, uh, it's amazing, like the way that they kind of uh Deacon says it, he goes, Sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you don't. And then you make it make do with what you have. But uh, I do think that that is uh an interesting um one of those things, one of those problems that arises when you're making a movie that you could have never expected, and you're like, Well, what do we do?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, exactly. And the way that I have broken the movie down for this discussion is I watched it very intently for reasons I'm gonna make clear coming up. Fargo, the motion picture, is seven days. You know, there's nighttime scenes followed by day scenes. It's very easy to track the seven days. So after the credits, the movie begins at a bar with William H. Macy as Jerry Lundegaard. Oh yeah, hectiame arriving at a bar. He walks in, Steve Buscemi is there as Carl, an incompetent loudmouth, Peter Stormare is Gare, is there, the incompetent psychopath, and we are given a title card that says Fargo, North Dakota, and a lot of this conversation, while very funny, you know, he's peed three times already, is that William H. Macy is an hour late. Carl and Gare were told to be there at 7:30. Jerry was told to be there at 8:30. So the movie is very clearly establishing for us that we are in Fargo, North Dakota at 8:30 p.m. Now let's talk about the scene a little. I just want to get that timeline straight. But you know, there's a lot going on here. This is where, like, we we hear that they're linked from this guy Shep from the auto shop, and we just get and we come to understand the plan that Jerry wants his these two idiots to kidnap his wife so that his father-in-law will pay the eighty thousand dollar ransom, and Jerry will give half to the criminals. And I love how this just baffles the two criminals, including Storm Air, who has one of his, you know, very few lines when he spleeds it, like, or your fucking wife, you know. Like it's just great. And Jerry, and then after this, I'll shut up, I'll promise. But Jerry needs money, he needs money from Wade. They ask him, they press it on it, press him on it. What kind of trouble are you in, Jerry? We never find out. We never find out why he got the $320,000 loan that he borrowed off cars that don't exist. We don't know why. That's one of the great kind of mysteries of the movie, and fun just to theorize about like what the fuck has this Ninkam poop done to get himself so far into debt? Like he clearly already owes the $320,000 for the cars, but then you know, he's asking for a lot more money than $80,000, as we'll learn. What has he done? We don't know. I love it. I love it. It's it's personal, it's personal. It's personal.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's uh that's that's personal. And yeah, it is and and it's great too because we actually don't ever need to know. Like this, this is not a mistake. This is not this is not like bad writing in any sort of way. This is just one of those things where this is actually makes your imagination go further because yeah, the because because so quickly what we realize what the money ends up becoming matters so much more than what it was initially needed for. Yeah. And it makes it makes it exactly makes it even funnier to kind of wonder how bad this guy fucked up in his life to need this kind of money, and where he would go to uh go about doing this. And then, yeah, and then we kind of establish that already from the get-go, we've got one guy who won't shut up, one guy who's an idiot, and then one guy who's basically scary silent.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, scary silent, bleach blonde baddie. Yep, baddie, baddie. He is bad, and but so you know, I this is a movie that I've watched in the past two years. I think I've watched it seven times, and that's just in the past two years because I love it so much. So take that into account when you add all the other years of my life on top of it. I've seen it a lot. I am we're breaking it down in a very specific way on this episode because it's a deep dive and it's fun. But all these details about like the Tan Sierra, hearing $80,000, what kind of trouble are you in, all this stuff kind of just goes by you. The police investigation just kind of goes maybe by you a little bit the first several times you watch it, or certainly the first, because ultimately the movie takes care of you so well it doesn't really matter. But when you start to investigate these details, it all tracks and it's really interesting. Yeah, and I was really paying attention to like follow the car this time, follow okay, what phone calls came in from where. So we'll, you know, we'll touch on that a little as we go. But they're talking about this Tan Sierra a lot. That's what William H. Macy, Jerry has brought for the two guys. Tan Sierra, ah, fuck it. I love how this ends and Carl can't find the words to finish his sentence, and he's like, Ah, fuck it. Let's take a look at that Sierra. It's just great, it's so cohen's, so so cohen's.
SPEAKER_00And and I love that too. Because yeah, Steve D. Bascemi, he just literally look like he literally gives up on whatever it was that he was gonna say because he just realized it's not worth it.
SPEAKER_01This this conversation has to you're at uh you're fuck it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, trying to figure out more of the plot essentially. I need more plot information. You know what? Never mind.
SPEAKER_01Okay, then our next scene pay attention to me, folks. We go to black and we get a title card that says Minneapolis, Minnesota. The movie wants us to know that we are in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Okay, Jerry walks in the door, his kind wife is making dinner. That's Kristen Rudrund. I'm probably saying it wrong. I'm sorry, some of these names are kind of tough, but she's great. She's in Minnesota. Every name, yeah, a lot of names are tough. She's a Minnesota native, she was in Drop Dead Gorgeous, so I just wanted to call her out. Yeah, that's great. She loves, yeah. See, I knew you'd like that. Hi, Han. Jerry comes home. Father in law Wade is there. Wade hates Jerry, it's amazing. He won't even make eye contact with him at the dinner table until he says Gene and Scotty never have. To worry, oh, there's so much there. It's great. Scotty's important here. He is Gene and Jerry's son. And Scotty, uh, kind of in a throwaway line asks if he can leave dinner. He wants to go meet up with his friends at McDonald's. And his father, Jerry, says, No problem, be home by 9 30. Okay, bye. Harv Presnell, who everyone knows is Wade. You know, grunts out a few things. So that that's our that's the first day of Fargo. Real quick for Harv Presnell. He hadn't been in a movie since 1969. They brought him out of retirement. What? And not only is he great in this, but immediately Parr lays it into face-off. He's the both. He's the boss that Travolta kills. Saving Private Ryan. We are gonna find him and we are gonna get him the hell out of there. He's in Dawson's Creek. Five episode arc in Dawson's Creek. He's an old school, great actor. Love Harv Presnell. And he he plays such a convincing asshole in sub roles, but by all accounts, he was just a really nice guy. And I love that they brought it back for that. Now, we just went through the first day of Fargo pretty carefully, didn't we? All right. Okay. On the main feed Cohen Brothers episode, you did hail Fargo as the coveted. You gave it the coveted. What are you watching? Nick Dostal, no perfect movie, the highest award, frankly, than any movie can win anywhere. And then dedicated listeners, Patreon listeners will know that you retracted that. You retracted that bit, and you explained that because I had sent you a voice memo a few months ago explaining in rather careful detail how there is a gaping continuity error in the beginning of Fargo, and you explained that after careful consideration, you think I'm correct. So we're gonna go through that error now.
SPEAKER_00All right, we're gonna go through it. And it's and and this is one where like I can't really turn an eye to this one. Like the the the infamous pulp fiction one, I can live in my own little happy fairy tale world of there's an another day unaccounted for, which is not a correct, but I I can I can live with that and and completely ignore it. I can't ignore this one. This one, there they're just there is no getting around this one, and it's not like it's this is not gonna make or break a movie. It doesn't ruin the movie, no, not at all, but it does take away from the N D W A Y W N PM.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, the the award has been rescinded. I'm very sorry to say. Like, screw you, best original screenplay Oscar and best actress. You just missed out on the God.
SPEAKER_00All right, folks, here we go.
SPEAKER_01You missed it, you had it and you lost it. This error is in the very beginning. Hear me now. We watch William H. Macy as Jerry drive his car and the Tan Sierra he is towing into the bar parking lot. A title card tells us we are in Fargo, North Dakota. It's the only scene in the entire movie that takes place in Fargo. I love that. Jerry meets Carl and Gare, they immediately argue about time. Jerry was told to be there at 8 30. So, as I've said, it's 8 30 in Fargo, North Dakota. Okay. The two men talk very briefly. It's or the three men talk very briefly. Not a long conversation. One assumes the that it ends with him going outside to look at the Sierra. The next scene is Jerry walking into his home. A title card tells us it's Minneapolis, Minnesota. He has a bag of groceries in hand. His kind wife greets him. Father-in-law is watching hockey. They all sit down to dinner, including their teenage son Scotty. Scotty asks to be excused to visit his friend at McDonald's. He's told to be home at 9 30. Here is what the logic of the film wants you to believe. Jerry talked with the criminals very briefly, got groceries, sped home, was eating dinner by 8.50 p.m. At I mean, that's ridiculous, but at 8.50 p.m. and telling his son to be back home by 9.30 p.m. That is all very, very fast, and it makes movie logic sense if you don't realize that Fargo, North Dakota, and Minneapolis, Minnesota are three and a half hours apart. So even if we don't know that geography, there are holes here. This kind of domesticated family in this area of the country in the late 80s, I'm not really buying that they're starting dinner at 8.50 p.m. And the sun therefore would not be excused and told to be back in 40 minutes. That it's all very, very hasty. So even in their reality of the film, it doesn't track. Unless you think the bar he met the criminals at was right next to their house, but it's not because where was Jerry driving in the beginning? I'll tell you where. In fact, here is the actual reality. Jerry very likely told his wife Jean that he was going to Fargo, North Dakota after work. If he left his office directly at 5, that would put him at Fargo at 8:30 to meet the criminals. And then he would be home by uh 12 30 a.m. in the morning. Jerry, in reality, has to drive all the way back from Fargo to his home in Minneapolis. If he is meeting criminals at 8:30 p.m. in Fargo, there's no way in hell he is home in time, even for a late dinner. It is not possible. I go, okay, he picked up the groceries before and before meeting the criminals and left them in his car. It's cold, they could be preserved. It it the timeline is still absolutely hours off. The argument that the dinner scene is the next night is not correct. Jerry's wearing the exact same clothes, and the first thing his wife says to him is, Welcome back. How was Fargo? Indicating that her husband is returning from a long drive. And here is the kicker. This is what does not make sense at all. Even if the movie wants us to gloss over that Fargo and Minneapolis are far apart, like, oh, whatever, geography doesn't matter. Why do they show us Carl and Gare driving so often? They argue about how long they're driving, and then they literally recreate the long drive Jerry made during the opening credits. That's the drive they're on during the whole pancakes conversation. Like their drive is so long to them, in fact, that they stop halfway at the town of Brainerd to have pancakes and get laid. The next day they finish their long drive to Minneapolis and kidnap the wife. The distance from Fargo to Minneapolis is accurately depicted with the criminal narrative, but it is completely ignored within Jerry's timeline. It makes no sense. That's it. It's just very fucking weird.
SPEAKER_00Well, and and this is the thing that I can't really let go of because I'm I'm I'm able to swallow the pill of let's just pretend that Fargo, North Dakota is 20 minutes. Let's just say, let's just say that. You know, 20 minutes away. So it's 8:30, they're having this conversation. They go outside, look at the Tan Sierra. And let's just say, at best, like that's probably like Jerry's in his car at 8 45. I don't believe the groceries thing. I think the groceries thing, he gets that after he's done this. He absolutely does have on his way home. Yeah. Yep. And so he grabs this and let's again, yeah, even say that it's it places him back at home at 9 p.m. in some sort of crazy like fast timing. And then, yes, it's the family is not gonna be that kind of family is not gonna be eating dinner. She's still cooking.
SPEAKER_01Like she's still cooking. It's not like, where are you, hun? We've been waiting for you. That makes no it's you add that, and then you take out the sun, has to be back by 9:30. That's how I caught all this. It's all it's them timestamping everything constantly. It it does, it does not track.
SPEAKER_00The only thing that I can think of, this and this is a big stretch. Uh, is that he stayed in Fargo for the night and then came back and then what the fuck was he doing all day?
SPEAKER_01Like it, yeah. So I may be able to believe that, but then just like Pulp Fiction, all you're doing here is adding in this phantom day that doesn't exist.
SPEAKER_00You're adding in a phantom day, yes.
SPEAKER_01I promise you, screenwriters, when they write movies, like they're with a movie that's so tightly organized, Quentin Tarantito for Pulp Fiction and the Cohen brothers for Fargo are not adding in a phantom day that we never see where all this convenient shit happens.
SPEAKER_00It's not happening. Well, in in Pulp Fiction, they definitely did. But in this one, and in this one, no, and I and that's the other thing, too, is because if let's say he did get a hotel, then he would be staying the night in the hotel, but he would have packed another pair of clothes because he probably was gonna have to wake up early, drive, and then come back home after that day. And that is where everything doesn't add up in that way. So, yeah, there's no way. I mean, and and all that really would have had to have been doing too is you add a line in, and somehow, like, you you tell, and that's the thing, too, is that I don't think he'd want to be away from from from home for a day, right? I think he he wants to get back in there because once this deal is in motion, it's in motion. So day two is when okay, so yeah, so they're on their trip and they're doing that. It's day three where the abduction happens. So that would mean that.
SPEAKER_01Because the kidnappers are taking that day two to drive, it's only two and a half hours from Fargo to Brainerd. Believe me, I've looked this all up. Yeah, and you know, that's when they stop off and have pancakes and get laid at the Blue Ox hotel there with the two prostitutes.
SPEAKER_00That's yeah, so and that's where this does not work. That because if it's if we're watching them take the same trip in the Tan Sierra, and that even kind of brings up too, like, like why well, I mean, uh, they need Why meet all the way out there?
SPEAKER_01Well, no, yeah, they need a car, but it's also like, why meet all the way the hell? Why meet three and a half hours away for this drop of the car? Why not meet 30 minutes outside of town? I mean, I don't know. I'm not even that's fine, but it would even make sense. Jerry, like, knocked off work at noon and then left for Fargo, is there by like 5 p.m. It would still be dark outside because I think this is you know, it would be close to being dark, and then he leaves by like I don't know, 5 30, then makes it home by night, but it still doesn't like it. Yeah, it's just it's just a big hole.
SPEAKER_00That's all. It's it's a big hole, and it brings up another interesting point that I never even thought of until you just said it. I can't believe I never made this connection. That the title is Fargo, and the movie doesn't. That's the only scene that takes place there. Yeah, why the hell is this? This movie should be called Brainerd.
SPEAKER_01This movie should be called Brainerd. Sounded dumb. I thought that it sounded like a dumb name. And Fargo, not only it sounds yeah, it sounds cool, it looks cool, and they're you know, everything kicks off here. This is where the first meeting is, the plan is enacted there. But no, that's also kind of a there's far more scenes that take place in Minneapolis, and then there's like one scene in Fargo. That's one of the big that's a funny fuck you to me as well. I think that is their humor as well. I absolutely do because they're writing this screenplay, like they could have set that first scene anywhere. I mean, it could be called fucking Wichita, like they could have said it anywhere, and they do that, yeah. So I don't know, it's just weird. I didn't notice this gap in the timeline until this year, and then furthermore, I've never heard anyone talking about this to where it makes me suspect myself and call myself into question. I'm like, do you have this wrong? Are you just flatly missing something? But you're not. I mean, the movie fuck it. Let's go, let's take a look at that Tan Sierra. We fade out, we we get a title card in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It's that night. It I mean, the logic of film editing tell this whole movie goes in order. There's never a flashback, there's barely any cross-cutting, there's only one scene of cross-cutting. Everything in Fargo, everything is on screen, goes in order, and every day is accounted for. This does not ruin the movie for me, but I just it it was so gaping when it popped out to me, and I went, Oh, well, wait, what? So that's that's all. That's all.
SPEAKER_00And and correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't uh doesn't each day sort of end with a bit of a fade?
SPEAKER_01Um, that that is that'd be a whole other conversation because you know, Roderick Janes, who are Joel and Ethan Cohen, they edit all of their movies, and it's really interesting. It it what there wasn't a math to it like that. I actually tried to keep up, but there are scenes and end with fades, scenes that end with harsh cuts, yeah, scenes that come up with fades, scenes that come up with harsh cuts. So that would be something that, like, in a commentary, if they felt the need to explain it, I would love to know that stuff. I'm always fascinated. Like, when does a an editor or director decide to fade out versus cut out? But yeah, I mean, there are a lot of scenes that end like with characters in bed, or there are a lot of days in the movie that end with characters in bed, like either watching the tonight show or what there's a lot of TV. There's a whole lot of TV and you know, watching nature documentaries, all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But let's move on from that. Oh, yeah. We're we're we're feeling bad.
SPEAKER_00No, don't feel bad. Listen, they need to feel bad. Should they have to give back to Oscar?
SPEAKER_01Should they have to give back their original screenplay Oscar for this whole should Tarantino have to for Pulp Fiction? No, if anyone is confused about my terr my pulp fiction gap or hole, go listen to our Saturday Night Fever episode, which I know, which is hilarious. In there, I know why.
SPEAKER_00And any and any episode, if you were like, if you really want to hear about like Nick and Alexander, I didn't even plan to do that.
SPEAKER_01I didn't plan for it.
SPEAKER_00No, it just happened and it was it was it was breathtakingly, brilliant. But um, I can I can't not see this one. Pulp fiction, I that gets me too upset, so I just have to let that one go and just continue to live in in ignorance. Um, I refuse to listen to you. I refuse to listen to your logic there. I am I am making my own reality with pulp fiction.
SPEAKER_01All right, well, there we go. Let's move on because I do love Fargo a lot. Now I'm no more qualms for I don't even I just think that's funny. I don't even get like mad at the movie about it, but whatever. Day two. The film, the earth, you know. Really, you could start the movie here on day two. Yeah, we just wake up with kidnappers arguing about pancakes and sex. Yeah, it's a great, it's a great place. Really, you can start the movie here. You can start the movie here. SPA same private Ryan commentary. Go listen to that. We were in our perfect state of mind. Day two. We meet the kidnappers in the car. They are driving the drive that Jerry did the night before from Fargo to Minneapolis. They stop off at Brainerd, and then we get straight to Jerry in his shop. This is the true coat scene. I love this scene so much. This is Bucky, you know, you're a bald faced liar, a fucking liar.
SPEAKER_00Love it. And I love that too because that's that's we're getting everything we need to know. Like, yes, it is it is a character that's saying this to him in a in a different sort of capacity, but that is what Jerry Lundegaard is. Jerry Lundegaard is a liar, he lies about everything. And and he's not very bright. So you but I mean, essentially, that is what we are dealing with here. Is we are just dealing with a real, real dim liar.
SPEAKER_01Very, very so, and yeah, when we see we see that play out, like he's you know, goes into the boss, like he's gonna ask about True Croat, doesn't talk about it all, comes out. Oh, he's never done this before. I also love the insistence in the movie about this penny pinching. You have a lot of characters arguing about very small sums, like a four-dollar parking garage fee. When in the reality of the movie, you're about to net $40,000, so just pay the $4 fee, but instead we argue about it, had this True Croat thing is gonna add like just some bucks to his commission, but he's so hell-bent on it. Uh, it's hysterical. And then yeah, we pick up with the hitman in Brainerd, the blue ox, where I just I talked about this a lot in our made feed episode when we cut to them going at it, you know, both criminals having sex with prostitutes in bed right next to each other, fade to black, smash cut, same shot, lights off, TV on, everyone watching the tonight show. Oh, it's brilliant. Oh my god. Day three in Fargo begins with they're at home at the Lundergard house there. Wade calls. I love it. Scotty lets out a there's no fucking way. That's they use like, you know, Steve Buscemi will say fuck like every other word in the movie, but guys, you know, Scotty, the Bucky at the shop, they don't say it. I just love that some characters are so hesitant to curse. It's doing that Minnesota nice thing, bucking that right up with this criminal activity. And then we get the first, you know, instance of Stan, Stan Grossman. He says it's pretty sweet. I love that. And he's like, you know, Stan Grossman. I love all the little affectations of the characters.
SPEAKER_00Uh, I love this. And and uh I like the um that you know Deacons talks about like the shot construction for that because the first thing we see is basically you're getting both the mom and the son in the one shot while he's eating cereal and having that, and then like the they're like the coens they shot construct their movies so well, so efficiently. So Deacons is sort of like this is just real simple stuff. It's just sort of like, all right, we're just when he turns, we're gonna be over here, and then when Jerry comes in, we're gonna be right there, and it couldn't be like more paint by numbers in that way, but that's exactly what the movie needs to be, yeah. Um, and it's just it's it's really, really great. And then, yeah, and then you you get the more shot where now the kids and the mom are kind of out of it, and it's just Jerry saying some shit.
SPEAKER_01Yes, oh no kidding, yeah. He thinks he's gonna this fucking idiot thinks he's pulling off this deal. So, what does he do in all his wisdom? He goes we're now we're in the shop. This is what we're talking about. This whole thing when he talks to Shep is all one shot. Yep, and we start you know outside, then we go under the car, and then when he exits, we go inside. And there's a really important detail here because we've heard Shep's name before, now we're meeting him. Yes, Shep is insistent that he only put Jerry in touch with Grimswood, which is Gare. That is so that's Peter Storm Mare, not Steve Buscemi. This is really important. He doesn't even acknowledge Carl at all. In fact, he says he's never heard of him, so hang on to that later. That relationship between Shep and Carl is intentionally blurred as well. And I like I like that aspect, but I just love you know Shep's whole demeanors. Great, it's fantastic. Jerry Shepard. Okay, thanks, thanks.
SPEAKER_00Like nobody fucking knows what they're doing here. Like no one, like no one, or or if they do, they've got such a small grasp on things, but that even goes later when you're dealing with Harv Presno, like who, by all accounts, is a much more intelligent person, and he's got a position of power and wealth, and you know, but even he is operating in the same way as everybody else, where he's only got his hands on like a little bit of this and not enough to be successful. And no, spoiler alert, he's gonna pay for that. And he's gonna pay the price. No gene, no money, yeah. So, yeah, no gene, no money. Uh it so yeah, so uh it's an interesting thing. I didn't think about that until we just started saying it is how like no one really has a grasp on anything, even um, even Marge. She sort of like she's putting it together, and but she doesn't really have a grasp on the and she even says it like even in the the meeting with uh with Mike. She's sort of like, Oh, there's not really a lot to tell. Like, we don't really have a lot of information, you know. We don't really know what's happening here, yeah. Yeah, and she just kind of stumbles, kind of. I you know, I mean, she's put enough together to be on the right track, but that's a happy accident.
SPEAKER_01Well, that's and a lot of we're gonna talk about that with the Mr. Mora scene. Like a lot of police investigations are you're chipping away, you're getting these little tips, little pieces of evidence. Here's a Tan Sierra. Did we check the trooper's ticket book? You know, what about calls made? All this, and then putting that together. But yeah, no one, no one ever the first time any other character learns how much Jerry's actually asking for is when Buscemi opens that briefcase and is Jesus fucking crazy. You know, his mouth's all shot to shit. So we learn that way later. We still think there's eighty thousand dollars at stake here. Nah, hold that thought. Uh after the shop, the next next scene is the we're back in the car with the kidnappers, they've left Brainerd, now they're going to Minneapolis on their way to Jerry's house. They've taken a very long time to get there. Total fucking silence. Two can play at that game. Just see how you like all you can say that nope.
SPEAKER_00He goes, I did. It really is a uh it really is a showcase for Steve Bushimi because you know we talked about this a little bit on our previous episode where you know, in some of these movies, like Bushimi like doesn't talk at all, like doesn't really have a lot. Like Donnie, he's gotten like almost no dialogues about that movie, and this is one where he just doesn't shut up. And he's so good at being that kind of a guy, like just very, very good at being that kind of weaselly. But he but he is like he is sort. I mean, that's the crazy thing. He is sort of the brains of the operation on first.
SPEAKER_01I know. Well, that's gonna, yeah, we'll see how that goes. You'll take care of it. Yeah, yeah. We'll see how that works.
SPEAKER_00How we can take care of it here in Brainerd.
SPEAKER_01We go back to the auto shop. And this is when Jerry gets his first call from the loan company officer. I love this guy. He's the same guy that calls about Columbia Records subscription and a serious man. And he's also the actor who offers it is our most modestly priced receptacle in the Big Lebowski, the funeral guy. So I just love him. You're a hard man to get a hold of there, Mr. Lundegaard. And this is yeah, where we learn. It's all these little character textual details like this dude is taking out 320 grand in loans. He's borrowed on cars that don't exist. Why? Like, why is he doing this? We don't know. We don't know.
SPEAKER_00And and I really have to. This is where we gotta give a little bit of props to William H. Macy here for how good of a performance that he delivers here because this scene in particular, watching him deal with his doubling down ability is crazy.
SPEAKER_01Oh, the deal already went through.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, like, yeah, like the heck do you mean? Like my hands are tied. Like, I like it right up. Oh, yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah, we see it on him. Oh he like sort of feels the weight of the problem, but then completely blames it or shifts it to something else immediately. And what what he shifts it on like holds no water at all. Like none of it. He goes, No, the order went through. I I I have the paper. I'm looking at it right here. Like it, like these things, like what you're saying doesn't make any sense. Yeah, like there's just something about him and his look that he has that just goes so perfectly with this character, and then his his uh expression of it is amazing. And so, yeah, just a little shout out to William Mitch Macy for being so good.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, all the fumbling, all the like which was scripted, but just plays it so well and all that conflict on his face about everything that was going on, and then keep in mind all of this, everything we're seeing is his own doing. He's created all of this, yeah, all of it. Why? We don't know the main reason, you know, what he owes all this money for, but he's gotten himself into untold amounts of debt, and it's all his doing, and that's playing that is part of his conflict as well.
SPEAKER_00And he never seems to like show remorse for it. Like he'll never he he he's got those breaks of being frustrated, or he'll be like, oh geez, like he'll get like you know, like kind of exasperated by it, but he never internalizes it in that sort of like moment where he puts his head in his hands, be like, This is all me. I fucked up so bad. He never once has that. It's always it's always in forward motion. I'm just someone that would never even ever behave like that. Like, I I I will like if something goes wrong, I will just completely feel like, How is this my fault? So I find it fascinating to see characters that don't have that, like switch, like they see the problem, but they are not at all going to be like, oh, the problem's me.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, he's so Jerry Lundegaard is sociopathic in that way. I mean, coming up in a little bit, we're gonna get when Stan Grossman is like, and how about Scotty? And Jerry has not even thought about him. Oh, yeah. Gee, Scotty, yeah, your teenage son who's just had his mom be kidnapped. Like, he you might want to check in with him, buddy. No, he's just thinking about money, singing about himself, how he can get out of his jam. Well, gee, yeah, there's that. So they don't know that. It's personal, yeah. Uh yeah, next scene, it's a great one. It's a great Cohen Brothers set piece, The Abduction, which in typical Cohen Brothers fashion starts normally enough with Gene, you know, watching TV, and then Carl just coming up and putting his glass, his, you know, hands on the glass so he could see through the window, which is funny. And then as soon as he breaks that, the coins are like, you know, Carter Burwell's score takes off, Gare smashes through the front door, and this is real. This is a home invasion, and you you should be scared. And we are. I mean, it's it's just a great scene that also has moments of like levity, you know, I need on like that. And yeah, and then and then moments of great tension, the you know, the phone through the door, the great one shot of him putting on the onguen on his hand and staring at the shower curtain. It's just it's great stuff, it's fantastically staged, it's just brilliant, and it's simple again, too.
SPEAKER_00Like very simple. Like when you really look at that movie, when you look at the shots that came up, like they're not doing anything fancy here. They're they're like, but that's even why it makes like that scene where uh Carl actually breaks in so scary because it's so real, it just feels like that.
SPEAKER_01How it would be, huh? So that she plays that hesitancy, hesitancy very well, but yeah, it's just brilliantly staged, like the whole thing.
SPEAKER_00It it really is, and um, and then yeah, and it's just very easy stuff. And I love that look in the mirror because at first I always think that he's looking at himself for a split second because he's just off in his own little like psycho world, but then he realized that it's not that at all. He's actually like thinking that she's behind him, which she is, and then she ruins it. Like, she just comes out of there like a like a banshee and uh and takes herself out, takes herself out.
SPEAKER_01He just pokes her, and it's like, okay, well, you know, that's done. He's got the ropes, and Steve Buscemi is always playing Carl as a bit of an idiot, but we're never quite sure. I mean, even at this point in the movie, about this Gare guy, but we know enough to be like intimidated and scared, and Storm Air is gonna you know play all that beautifully talking about these contrasting characters, the way in the big Lebowski Buscemi is so you know, he's funny, but he doesn't talk a lot. And Storm Air is playing one of those like dipshit nihilists, he's an idiot who's just talking all the time. Like Cut Avia Johnson, exactly, exactly. So, yeah, I uh not to mention Armageddon, that mat his masterpiece performance in that.
SPEAKER_00Was he also was he uh the dude?
SPEAKER_01He was in Bergman films in the 80s, like he was in Igmar Bergman movies in the eight. Yes, like that's what he would do in like Sweden and stuff, and they came brought him over here to play fucking psychos. I mean, he had been acting before in America long before Fargo, but that was the one that kind of broke him out. But my god, he's been in so much.
SPEAKER_00He was in the lovely bones, right? He was like the the murderer, like the kidnapper. No, that's Stanley Tucci. That's Stanley Tucci. That's the Tooch. He looks he looks a lot like him.
SPEAKER_01He does look like him in that the makeup, the hair, it does, yeah, it does make him look like that. Yeah, he's in Fanny and Alexander. He's yeah, I mean that's crazy. He's he's in shit. I love it, it's hilarious. Next scene, Wade's office. Jerry is so damn dumb. He thinks he can ask his rich father-in-law. This it really doesn't make sense for $750,000 to build a parking lot. Like, Jerry's not a developer, he's not anything, he's a used car salesman. And he thinks, like, oh yeah, the my father-in-law agreed to this deal, so he's gonna give me this principal amount of money, which would, as we understand, clear his debts, which is why he tried to talk to Chef to potentially call off the kidnapping. God, he's so dumb. And then I just love Wade standing here, Stan Grossman. We're not a bank, Jerry, and it's just I mean, and you know, Wade letting the frustration go like, what? I'm not talking about your damn guarantee, Jerry. Oh, it's so good. But we're I mean, scene after scene after scene, we are learning that Jerry is incompetent, he is dumb, and he is greedy. And we're either learning all those or one of those at a time, and that is a dangerous combination. Because anytime a husband is desperate for money in the true crime world, look out, it ain't gonna go well. This dude's responsible for so many deaths by the end of this movie. For the rest of his fucking life. Oh my god. Scotty up to Scott's getting raised by Stan.
SPEAKER_00I know seriously, that poor kid's got no parents. The the um the uh I mean, this really couldn't have gone worse for for for Jerry because he shows up with this idea to hopefully get money and ends up like getting even more screwed up because they think this is a good deal.
SPEAKER_01This great scene ends with that, like we're talking about that great overhead shot of Jerry walking to his car, snow, and then he gets in the car, he's gotta scrape the car off, and then he has his little first little freak out. It's great. One take unbelievable. One take one time. That's what Deacon said. I think he laughs too. He's like, I love this. Look at the frustration. We just did that on one take. It's great. I love Deacon so much. And then, yeah, we we talked about this scene in our in the Cohen breakdown a lot when he gets home and you know, Gene's gone and he's practicing it's just total sociopath shit. Oh, geez, oh Wade, it's Gene, and just practice, and then you know, calls and gets a secretary.
SPEAKER_00Oh man, it's so perfect.
SPEAKER_01Like that, like that's a sociopath, man. This dude is nuts.
SPEAKER_00The way that that whole entire sequence reveals itself is so perfect. Yeah, because at first you're like you're thinking that he's talking to someone, then you realize he's just rehearsing, and then he actually puts it on, then he can't even get to where he needs to get to.
SPEAKER_01Oh, maybe I mean, maybe the greatest set piece of the movie starts innocently enough. We're in the car, they get pulled over, a chase is gonna ensue. It's one of my favorite set pieces of the Cohn brothers' career. Immediate tension.
SPEAKER_00It's that good.
SPEAKER_01Oh, it's so great. You know, they get pulled over by the honest cop. This scene has shocking violence, unexpected humor because whoa, daddy, that's kind of funny. Oh my god, I love it. That exceptional reveal of the car coming over the hill. They pass, we see innocent faces. Gare gives chase, hunts them down, bang, bang. Stormair is out of his fucking mind in this scene. Like, as the character, but just all of it. The most he says in the movie as the characters in this sequence, beginning with, you know, shut the fuck up to her, but then all of it, you'll take care of it. You are smooth, smooth man. No, like he just it it's like what Chino says in Heat. Like, when when it came down to it, these guys didn't waste a second. Like, why? One cop already sold, so kill the other one. This dude is just like ready to bang bang a fucking cop on the side of the street in the middle of nowhere. How do you think this is going to go? So now we're really seeing, in my opinion, Gare's incompetence step in. He's violently, he's homicidally incompetent. You can't just do that and expect to get away.
SPEAKER_00And I think you know, we we learn about Carl too. I mean, I don't know what his life has been in terms of like the criminal world, but he very much plays that scene as that was the first sort of murder that he's seen.
SPEAKER_01Fascinating question. I'm glad you brought this up because yes, I think he's very surprised by the brutality of it, but he is like Aaron that he pops off with little hesitation and kills Wade. Boom. Like it is done. He does not waste a second to kill Wade. So, like, that's a fascinating conversation to me. Has Carl ever been responsible for or ever killed someone? Is this the first time he's ever seen it? It is definitely establishing that one of these guys is far more violent than the other.
SPEAKER_00Well, now because because they just they still have just abducted the wife. She's not yet. But yes, this is the first time murder is now a part of this whole entire web that's happened. Blood has been shed. Yeah.
unknownWhat do you mean?
SPEAKER_01Heck do you mean one of my favorite moments in the film is in that scene, which we'll get to.
SPEAKER_00And uh, and just going into a little bit of like the Deacon stuff, because I liked him talking about this scene. Um This was great. Yeah, the blackout was the blackout, and how the idea was this was the Cohen's is sort of the look of it, and they tried to do this as much as they could. Was we have very few night scenes, but when we do, we want it to be as black as it can possibly be. And then we're in the day, we're trying to get it as like completely like white out as it can possibly be, just to kind of give like that stark contrast, and um, so that was that was the what was up for them in terms of how to light this movie and then the challenges that they found throughout it. But uh, and then looking at this, they were asking, well, how are we lighting this? Where does the light come from? We how do we want to kind of do this? And they landed on just being as simple as possible, it's just the light from the headlights, and of course it's very stylized because you do get that overexposure of when they're in the car waiting for the cop, and you got that perfect sort of just like like a like a mask right perfectly over Steve Bushimi's eyes, like a blindfold.
SPEAKER_01The cop's headlights are reflecting off their rear view into his eyes. So simple. I mean, we're saying simple, like it's not like this shit's easy to pull off, yeah. There is a simplicity to it to where, and and like when we're talking about the blackout, they didn't put lights in the fucking grass to so we could see when storm air is chasing them. Exactly, like in no country, we can see when Roland is running from the cartels. Yes, the sun is coming up, but like they lit that in a way that they want you to be able to see everything out there, you know, moonlit, whatever. But in this, it's like if you're out there in near Brainerd and Minnesota, there's no streetlights, and if there, if it's a moonless night, you are not seeing shit. No on your dossier's headlights, nothing.
SPEAKER_00Yep, nothing. You are pitch black. Yeah, I love that. Just yeah, just really good shit. And then, yeah, just all the editing, the pacing of it, the cuts when they happen, the a when by the time that that scene's over, you you really do feel like you've just seen one of the most well constructed murder sequences in any movie I can think of.
SPEAKER_01Same here, and they had done there's a you know, there's a few good killings in Blood Simple, or some great deaths in Miller's Crossing. They've done it before, but not like this, not with this level of like to do to do to do. Because there's you know the roadside showdown in Blood Simple, but that is very, very drawn out, very patient, on purpose. But here they're like, Yeah, we can do this in seven minutes and wow, people.
SPEAKER_00And it's also it shows you because I said that even on the on the on the main feed pod with this was it was like this was this is now the updated version of Blood Simple. Like they recreated this after having more experience, more money, and they're like, All right, we we we did it all right in Blood Simple. Now let's knock it out of the park.
SPEAKER_01They do another variation in No Country for Old Men. And they do I mean it's not dissimilar, and there's almost about the same amount of time. That's like Blood Simple's 84, Fargo's 96, and then you're just skipping another decade to get to No Country. And that one, I mean, everyone who watches that movie remembers it's on it's like the fucking poster. It was on the cover of you know Llewellyn Moss running, and then the dog's chasing him, he's gotta shoot the dog, blah blah. But yes, they will do that stuff, but it never feels like they're running it back in a way that is lazy at all. It's just there are these great scenes. I love this scene, and so ends day three with two people dead in a field and a poor cop dead on the side of the road. I love the added detail that we learned that Carl hid kind of stayed in the trooper's car because he was cold. But on day four of Fargo, about 33 minutes into the film, we meet a brand new character, Marge Gunderson, Brainerd police chief. Frances McDormand is March Marge. She's a pregnant police officer. Her husband is played by John Carroll Lynch, Norm's son of a Gunderson. The first shot we meet them, a great wonder. It's just a great winner revealing her on the bed. She gets the phone call. There's another reveal of like, oh, this husband's really nice. I cannot tell you. Again, I don't know how many times I've seen like a dude wake up in a movie and do that like hawking a looky thing because he's just like waking up, and I'm like, that's so fucking authentic. Like, you know, gotta eat a breakfast, Marge. Oh, it's so great. That's all one shot, and the next thing is one shot.
SPEAKER_00The break, the breakfast nook is one shot. Yep. There, there's all these tiny little winners that are going on in this movie that just but but because it's not drawing attention to itself, most one stealth wanners, yeah. Most winners move.
SPEAKER_01Most winners, yeah. The camera operator, you're either on a track or they are walking with a steady cam. That's not what they're doing here. It's Deacons is like stationary, and the camera may move, it may push in a little, but this is what I call stealth winners, where they are not drawing attention to their like flashiness at all.
SPEAKER_00And that's usually the thing with winners. Oneers want you to know that they're winners, like they're sort of looking at me. Scorsese wants you to know. Yes, yes, he does.
SPEAKER_01PTA wants you to know. Yeah, and a fucking long track and shot, baby. Watch this. Deacons did 1917, which is made to look like a long take, but it's that is.
SPEAKER_00One thing I liked about this scene a lot was, and this is this goes to the acting, is where you really do feel the time of the morning that that is like that like and they had to fight for that location, they had to find a spot where it's like we need like this divide so that way we see the kitchen and we see the outdoor, but we need to see the window, so we get the blue light coming in. But again, these were all things that were all conceptualized beforehand. Yep, so storyboarded. Yep. You know, storyboarded, but to the point of where there wasn't gonna be much need for actual problems or conversation to have beforehand. The base bit thing is sort of like, all right, we'll just have to do this really early because that's how we're gonna get that light. So that there's that's how you do it.
SPEAKER_01Ending with a great another great button of a scene, hun, prowler needs a jump, just perfect. Just perfect. Next scene, I love this. This is again like a very crime scene evidence latent scene. But when she discovers the crime scene, we get a lot of info about Marge right away. She is not really upset by the state of the body, so she's an experienced cop. She's not like, oh my god, this is terrible. Nothing like that. No, she maintains a good sense of gallows humor, humor throughout. She's very smart, she's putting together everything quickly, looking at you know, footprint tracks, and she's in charge. She's the one running the show here. And I love that we get, you know, from his footprint, he looks like a big fella. It's all the uh it's great. You're a guy like helping her, it's great, great scene.
SPEAKER_00And and you know, and and it it's uh it it's it's always good to balance that with sort of like the the the dumber kind of like you know, like second in command there.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, uh DLR.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, like I think you might be a little bit lazy in your uh police work there. I gotta go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so that's exactly that's how they found it. The cop writing who pulled, you know, Carl and Gare over, started writing dealer plate on a Tan Sierra. So that's kind of a sniff. But again, in all the dialogue of the movie, that may be kind of breezed over. They kind of want you to remember that joke. They want you to remember the yeah, I gotta question your police work a little bit there.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I love that. And in and it's the brilliant of it is because you are getting across that information, but you're doing it in the tone and cadence of this speech of this movie with characters that you end up finding endearing because of it. So, like, like the way that that that that officer is like holding the both cups of coffee while Marge does all the work is like, Oh, yeah, oh, that's a big deal, then, huh? Or whatever he's saying, but that's sort of like he he would be lost without her if he if he was up to this.
SPEAKER_01She bends over, like, you're okay, Marge. Like, yeah, I think I'm gonna barve. Oh, geez. It's like only yeah, well, that passed.
SPEAKER_02I loved it.
SPEAKER_01I'm hungry. I'm hungry again. Yeah, yeah. Uh the next, I mean, yeah, so that's all great. Really seeing Marge and her element. Next scene is a diner, and again, a very important scene between Jerry Jerry and Wade are arguing. Stan's gonna favor Jerry. But this is where we learn for the first time in the movie that Jerry wants one million dollars for the kidnapping, far more than the 80,000 ransom he told the kidnappers about. So now we're going, whoa, like that that's a huge, huge jump in how much you're asking for. Wade wisely wants to involve the cops. Jerry, of course, doesn't because he's the one behind it all. Stan agrees with Jerry, we're not horse trading here, Wade. And then outside is when Stan mentioned Scotty to Jerry. The look on William A. G's face. Oh, yeah, oh my god, geez, Scotty. And then that scene with the next scene with them is at home when he's reassuring him. It's so slimy. Oh, to me, are almost my grossest scenes of Jerry. Like, no, she'll be okay.
SPEAKER_00It's very creepy, very creepy. Oh, it's very creepy, and yeah, because like yeah, he has not thought once about his son. And then the next time we see his son, the son's fucking crying. It's like this kid's probably been alone for days.
SPEAKER_01He's like in his room, like like holding, I'm gonna call the call the police. Yeah, he's terrified, he's spinning out.
SPEAKER_00He's a kid, and yeah, and he can it and it's not like even like you know, Jerry's good at making him feel better about it, too. He's like, this is just how we have to play it, all right. Ah, God.
SPEAKER_01Oh no, don't do that, Scotty. Don't do that. Yeah, it's just it's okay. You're mean mean business, ain't mean business.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean, oh my god. And and again, like he doesn't like, he's again not seeing at all how much like hurt and suffering this is actually cause causing. He's just sort of like, no, don't do that.
SPEAKER_01Oh, that's gonna be just wants the money, just wants the money. We get I do want to say that uh Gare, Peter Storm Air there, he he talked his most lines were during the chase, and then he doesn't talk again until. Final scene. So we have a lot of stuff with him. Of and this one, for instance, our first time at the safe house out there by the lake, you know, when we see poor Jean just like again, there's humor in this, but there's tragedy, like running, you know, head covered in the snow, Carl whoops, and then Storm Air, Garrett's just looking at her like he like doesn't understand. He's like watching this animal run around, like it's really, yeah.
SPEAKER_00It's it's a great little insert scene. It's it's it's it's always very fascinating to watch characters that don't have a lot of dialogue that are as specific as what he's doing because there's never an explanation for it, but yeah, looking at him like it be almost confused by the situation in a way, like just being like, okay, all right. But yeah, it's just it's amazing to watch actors that just kind of like make those choices and and they're as believable as like when he is speaking, yeah.
SPEAKER_01All right, our next scene is at the police station when they want us to focus on the cuteness of Norm bringing his wife Arby's, she brought him nightcrawlers, but then there's you know, talks going on of citation book, Tanciera at that car was at the Blue Ox hotel two nights ago. Who do we go? Where are we next? Where are we next, Nick? We're at the Lakeside Club with our two pros. They are funny here, especially. I don't know, he's kind of funny looking. Again, which sounds funny, but that exact sentence is gonna come up again when we're talking to Mr. Mora. I just I just love Marge talking to these two, you know, pros. It's great.
SPEAKER_00And those are uh those are those are the real accents, those are uh yeah, those are those are not actors putting on. That's just exactly how they're from there.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, I love it. Cool Bears, and then now we're back in the safe house, and Carl's is fighting the TV. Blood means come on, I do too. And it's slow, just you know, Jean's kind of like resigned, she's just there, resigned herself. Gare's off in a fucking psychopathic trance.
SPEAKER_00He is the there's beer bottles everywhere, and like the setups of all the backgrounds for all that. Um, and then you've got like the breath coming from everyone, so you're knowing like it's like they've got the stove open so that it, you know, it just is heating up whatever it can. Just what a horrible place, yeah, to like yeah, hide out. Yeah, and yeah, you just have Carl just yelling, fuck, fuck, fuck. All this, you know, as he's slamming the TV.
SPEAKER_01Our next scene, another scene of a day ending with characters in bed. This is Marge going to sleep in front of the TV. Oh, yeah, I love John Carroll Lynch. Oh, okay, I'm turning in, Norm. Oh yeah, he's like, Oh yeah, and then oh, cut to black, and then what happens? We fade, we come back in, and this absolute psycho, Mikey Anagita, calls his high school friend after years of not talking to her at 10 45 p.m. on a work day. What a lunatic. Yeah, I will love the Cohen brothers forever for including this subplot forever.
SPEAKER_00That's our little first little glimpse of it. This is uh this is a really, really great subplot, and its payoff is in how well like the Radisson hotel scene ends up being. Oh my god. But yeah, no, and and and we also start to understand like how like sweet marches, like she did like she's just sort of like, oh well, that's okay, you know. I don't don't worry about it. And and and then, yeah, and then just like, what the hell is this guy talking about? I saw you on the TV there.
SPEAKER_01I thought, oh, that's whole March. We have another day, we're in the shop. This is day five of Fargo. This day is gonna go by quickly. This is when Carl calls Jerry, blood has been shed, and now this uh this is what I'm talking about in terms of petty, you know, financial arguments. I understand $40,000 is a lot of money, but not when you're scaling it against one million. So the fact that Carl is saying blood has been shed, we now want the full 80,000, and Jerry's arguing with him, like, oh no, geez, dude, you're about to get, if it all works out, so much more money. Like, just you know, fight a little bit but go, oh god, you know, fight. I just love that how much he's fighting with him. And it's just a moron, but I love, I think my favorite part of this because blood has been shed is hilarious. Don't interrupt me, it's hilarious. But when Macy goes, how's Gene? There's a long pause, and you hear Bushevi like earnestly, genuinely go, Who's Gene? He's like, My wife, it's so funny. Who's Gene? She's fine, blood has been shed.
SPEAKER_00Oh my god, it's so good. And yeah, and like and also, yeah, Jerry, too. Like, even though this deal has gone sideways on him so much to this point, whatever the new rules are, he he he goes, No, that's not the deal. Like, like it's just like the goal post keeps moving and in the wrong direction for him. But he he he has such resistance when the idea comes, he's like, Well, that's no, that's not how oh no.
SPEAKER_01Oh, geez, yeah, he's great, and then he hangs up, and then who calls back the loan officer. Oh, my patience is running thin, Mr. Lundegaard. Then just like he, you know, used the ice scraper to smash up the windshield, he's gonna have another little baby with his tantrum as he flings up the desk calendar. I love it. He's spinning out, losing control scene at day after day, day after carefully constructed day here in Fargo. No time unaccounted for. Next scene, maybe the best insert shot of the movie, that buffet. Just like camera going to the left, and we're seeing all this stuff, chicken fricasy.
SPEAKER_00Uh, love it. That I love when all of them are just loading up their plates and loading. And you know, and just the thing is like uh, you know, being from Buffalo, even though this is not Minnesota, that's those are Buffalo plates right there. Oh, yes, oh yeah. Normal, normal American size quantities. That's all that's going on in that plate. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01And there's oh yeah, they're looking forward to it. And then, you know, the officer comes in and we get again a few more details about the case. Blue Ox lobby pain, pay phone calls, payphones, remember those? Shep's name appears. Oh, I gotta okay, we gotta we gotta hit here. Then we're back at home with Jerry. Now it's kind of a redo of the diner. Jerry and Wade are arguing about the money, uh, and who's gonna drop it off. Wade, Jerry wants to go alone. Wade finally calls out Jerry's incompetence, Stan favors Wade. Wade's gonna deliver it alone. Uh, but I like this because now it's like Jerry's lost, but there are there's no control, like he just has no control of it. What's he gonna do? And then the spinning out of like, this is my deal, this is my deal. But no, dude, your plan is so dumb, like it just doesn't make sense. And everyone who knows you knows you're an incompetent idiot, so it's not gonna work.
SPEAKER_00I I'm glad you because yeah, it's exactly right. Anyone who knows you knows that you would fuck this up. So if you are Wade and you're like, that's my daughter on the line, I'm not gonna hold you in charge of this.
SPEAKER_01He doesn't even pay him the respect to give him eye contact most of the time. He's gonna hand this fucking idiot a million dollars. Nah, it really makes you wonder how they got together. I mean, he probably wooed her in some fashion. That's another real fun thread to go down. I imagine that he's like, oh, girl in town, richer than hell, father. So I'm you know, I'm I'm in there, I'm cool with the money, and then I'm just gonna go. I I don't know. This would all be literal fan theory, but there's a lot of it about why he has the debt. Some people say gambling debts, why Jerry, what he needs his debt for. We see golf trophies in his office. Like, is he a golfer and he has a lot of gambling debt? I don't know, something like that. But I think he probably met her around the way and just was overly nice to her, sniffing out that uh Wade Gunderson is the rich one of the richest guys in town. Wade, we don't know this yet. That's why Jerry has a job. Wade owns that dealership. Yeah, it's the only reason why he has a job. This dude is uh not even a two-time, this dude is like just a lifetime loser. And I think he found a girl who would you know tolerate him.
SPEAKER_00That's really all I can only imagine like him trying to like like talk to somebody during the courtship of that. He goes, Oh, yeah, she loves me, she loves me a lot. I'm gonna marry her, and then I'll get all that money. But she's she's she's that she's not the problem. I got her, that's fine.
SPEAKER_01Day six, Minneapolis Hotel. Marge checks in. I love that awkward walk-up to the front desk that just happened to me this weekend. The exact same thing. Went to a hotel. There's like four of them just standing there, and I'm like, hello, like none of them say hello. If one of you says hello to me, I'll go to you first. But you just go like, huh? What? Uh love it. Gets the intel on Shep. Very important. Ask for a good uh place to eat there. And then Radison there. They're addictionable. Are they reasonable? Yeah, I'd love that airport parking lot where Carl's gonna steal a license plate from another car. This is where he argues with the attendant about paying the four-dollar fee. I just love it. But everything on that parking garage rooftop was that's fake snow. And D could just like if you look in the background, there's no snow back there. So yeah, that's just and he, I think even says this is the only shot the movie with that like bright blue sky, which is how the sky looked a lot.
SPEAKER_00He yeah, he said that he goes, This is how it looked on most days when we were shooting. And he goes, and we had to just do this after the parking lot.
SPEAKER_01We're back in the shop. Marge wants to talk to Shep because she's heard, you know, you got a call from the blue ox there. Shep just, you know, one word in her nope. Yep. I love that. Then she goes, This is important. It's we don't know how all this is connecting. The call from Mikey Anagita, and then she the first time Marge is meeting Jerry in Jerry's office, she's asking Jared about the missing Tan Sierra. He writes it off, oh nothing like that. And she doing her Minnesota nice thing believes him. I'll let you get back to your paperwork there. The most uh one of the most important details we learn in this scene is that when he blurts out, no, Wade, my father-in-law, he owns it. And we don't we haven't known that yet. So that's a really important detail. But her Marge's insistence on taking people at their word, that's what all this is about, which she does here.
SPEAKER_00She takes him at his word. Yep. And we find out that he also has some history. So where when we end up seeing what he ends up doing to Carl and the reason as to why, it's all because he's not gonna go back to prison. Yeah. So the stakes are up for him, you know, in ways where now we realize, you know, where, you know, we're putting together the the breadcrumbs for how badly laid of a plan this was altogether. Yeah. And you're like, all right, and this guy's out of prison, he doesn't know what he's fucking doing.
SPEAKER_01No, you're calling people from the hotel you're staying at and like calling the guy who set you up, like, yeah, these are very, very dumb criminals. Point in fact, one of the reasons I broke this movie out by day, once Marge is on the case to her solving it, it ain't that many days. It's not that hard to run this case down because these people are so stupid. That's what's that's another one of the kind of genius things about the movie. They they're never labeling Marge is no, like you know, Sherlock Holmes either. She's just a steady cop following the leads, listening to the tips. That's it. Except when she goes the Radisson.
SPEAKER_00Well, but even still there, I was gonna say she leads with her sincerity. She does, you know.
SPEAKER_01That's our next scene, and I it's one of my favorite scenes just in the history of movies because lunch with Mikey Anagita. I really can't think of any other filmmakers doing this scene in quite this way. It is astounding because at face value, this has nothing to do with anything. It is this interlude with Marge that is funny, and again, it's like they're throwing off our scent to what this is, what uh intellect this is sparking within the characters, and they're throwing us off with like this outrageous guy, this Mikey Anagita, his overexcitement, the decision to sit next to her, being asked to move, talking about his quote unquote dead wife. The scene is so awkward awkward and brilliantly played by both of them. It's just great. It it's my favorite scene of the whole movie, to be honest. It it probably is mine too. This guy, Steve Park. You don't even think he's acting. You don't like you may even if you recognize him from do the right thing, in living color, kindergarten cop falling down, a serious man, snowpiercer, asteroid city, mickey 17. He's been in so much more. You forget all that. This dude is Mikey Anagita.
SPEAKER_00That and it's a fucking incredible, it's incredible, and and it's one of those scenes too where, yeah, exactly. Like we we end up getting a whole entire reason for this subplot, but we don't know it yet. And I think it's also really genius of the Cohen brothers because of the little bit of like the reward you get, like it almost doesn't even warrant the amount of time that this subplot takes. Exactly, exactly. And but this is a good uh example for filmmakers and screenwriters to where you can absolutely do shit like this. Like, if you like, like I don't know how this idea started, but I kind of love the idea as if what if you were trying to make something, but you just had this one really great idea for a scene you really like about this, you know, pregnant cop who's married happily, and we meet this guy, and then he just sort of awkwardly starts kind of putting the moves on her. She rejects rejects him with so much politeness. Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. You know, and that's what I love the way Francis McDorman plays this because she's very she's very stern. We're like, no, I prefer it if you sat over there. We get it, but then when he sits down there, she goes, No, it's fine, it's fine, don't even think about it. I don't determine to see. Yeah, no, I can watch it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, she's making excuses for him when in reality. You're weird, bro.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, you're weird, man. Get away from me. And um, and then yeah, this guy breaks down. We just get this unbelievable, like, three-minute scene. It's just it's it's it's a really great scene with humanity when you watch everything that's going on there because we don't know yet that he was lying. Yeah, he's he's trauma dumping fictional trauma. Yes, he's trauma dumping, yeah, that's a perfect way to say it. And but we b but we believe him in that moment of just this sad, weird, little lonely guy. And and here is Marge just giving him her time. And that's really all we end with this scene, too.
SPEAKER_01Like that it's awkward and that she kind of feels bad for him. Yeah, he's just like right now. So so you you think we should meet at another time, Mark? I always liked you so much. Yeah, uh it's just it's so good. Yeah, I think it's my favorite scene in the movie, too. And again, like, okay, so now a casual viewer, we're like, all right, this is paying off that phone call, you know. I oh, it's quarter to 11. I hope it didn't wake you. Okay, but like, what is this? And I mean, it's not even gonna click for her until the next day in the movie. We got some we have a lot of crazy shit that's gonna happen in the movie before she makes this connection. And then when she does make the connection, it's not, you know what the most common thing? I'm gonna talk about it now. The most common way movies do this is that one character is talking and another character is listening, and then that character who's talking says one thing that jogs the memory of the listener, and the listener pauses and goes, What did you just say? And then the talker says their thing again, and it triggers this blah, this light bulb going off in their head that I don't know why it's the only one I can think of right now. But in the hangover, when Mike Epps is talking about Roofies, and they're like, What'd you say? You know, you wake up on the show be called ceiling. You wake up on the ceiling, not on the floor, and then oh god, we know where Doug is. All that that's like the hacky way that so many movies do. So, a lot of my favorite movies have done this. This is a very different take on it. This is a big talker revealing something, but her aha moment is not gonna come for several more scenes, and when it does come, it is never explained to us. She never goes back to Norm and was like, Yeah, when I was talking with that Mike, it just made me realize that, like, well, again, it's not it's not even gonna pay off because in her world, Mike's just this sad old guy. So, in the world of the film now, we just the scene is done and we we're in the celebrity room with Carl at his next pro.
SPEAKER_00If you know that this is gonna pay off and you are like writing a movie where you do have this idea, this is how far out of the box you can go. Because once you do, as long as you connect it the way that the Coens end up doing that, you can do shit like this. And and and and it won't matter that in the moment we have no idea why we've just watched this scene at the Radisson Hotel, nor why Marge got this phone call in the middle of the night. We just go with it. We're like, we have no choice. Yeah, that's it's just yeah, we have no choice. That that's what the movie has done for us.
SPEAKER_01We know how long the movie is. We know there's we're like, well, there's only gonna be half an hour left to this thing, so let's just keep going. Let's keep going. But yeah, great scene. Love that you love it so much, too. Uh yeah, it's just it's really good. But again, it's gonna take like two more scenes for this thing to pay off. We jump right to the celebrity room where the man himself, Jose Feliciano Felice Navidad, is there performing. It's actually him. Carl's there with the pro. Why? Because he's hortier than hell. I'm going crazy down there at the lake. Like this dude just had sex with a prostitute a few days ago. Now he's got another one trying to make small talk with her. A little Kubrick thing, the old in out, in out, a little clockwork. Yeah, I did. I mean, that wrote that down right there. I was like, that's Kubrick. What the heck are you talking about? Now, another thing that is not explained by the Cohen brothers, but it has to have been intentionally kept vague. When we cut to the next scene, that pro is on top of Buscemi, and you know it's very funny. Where are you here? Uh, there you are. And he's going to town on her. Shep barges in. I mean, she's she's going to town, she's going to town on him, actually. Yeah, I'm sorry. And if you know Carl, that's his preferred position. Because when he was going at in the hotel room, that's what his lady was doing to him. It's all he knows. Here, seriously, I have something serious to talk about. Shep says he vouched for Gare, that he does not know Carl. But Carl is banging a pro in Shep's apartment. Shep bursts in, they obviously know each other. It's just interesting to think about. And also, once again, like the Cohen's know when to go starkly violent when they want to, but this is Chef's place. So why? I I don't know. It's the whole thing is really interesting when you examine it because I, you know, the first several times I watched this movie, I thought Shep's connection to Jerry was Carl, but it's not. It's Peter Stormair, it's not Buscemi. So clearly they know each other. Why is it being intentionally kept vague? I don't know, but I just think it's interesting to think about. It's kind of an interesting detail. Smoke a fucking peace pipe. Absolutely. Jesus beats the shit out of him. Because as you say, he's been threatened with being bounced back to jail, breaking probation. You should not be, you know, talking with criminals. And if that's what you're doing, you're gonna go back. That's what March said. So Shep's pissed, clearly. So now he's got that, and then we just go right from that getting whipped to the bar. This is interesting. I I only realized this when I was breaking the film down this way. This is the only cross-cut in the movie. Every other phone call in the movie, we just see one side of it. But here on the bar, Carl has just been whipped to shit, calls Jerry, demands to meet. Then we cross-cut to Jerry's home where Jerry's talking to Carl, but we see Wade in the background. And I just love the way he does that. Wade, you know, when the Carl or when the phone's on, don't you don't you harm Scotty there? He just puts on that hat and he's out. He's gone. And Jerry's like, What the fuck do I do? Like, Wade is I'm supposed to be dropping off this money. Jerry's feebly talking to Scotty up, so what's going on, Dad? He's putting on his boots, and it's just great, but that's it. That's really the only cross-cutting like back and forth in the movie. I just, you know, knowing that they edit their own movies. I thought that was interesting, but it's helping build up the pace. Another detail that I did not catch until this viewing, I never caught this ever. Ever. When Carl is talking to Jerry on the phone, Carl says, be at the top floor garage of the Radisson in 30 minutes. We have to assume that's the same Radisson Marge and Mike just had lunch at.
SPEAKER_02Oh my god.
SPEAKER_01Why would there be more than one Radisson in Minneapolis? So that now, when I heard that, I went back far too many times because I'm out of my mind. And when Buscemi is taking the license plate from the car, I always thought that was the same top of the parking garage. It's not, it's a different garage. So when he goes and kills Wade, that is a different garage.
SPEAKER_00That's a different garage.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And I I mean I studied it, I looked, I went and looked at locations. I'm insane. But because I cause that would have been like the stupidest thing. Decays the parking garage, steal a license plate, and then have your meat there later that day. That would be idiotic. He ain't that dumb. But yeah, like the the parking attendant stand is different. Stuff on the you know, the pillars are different. But either way, I assume that's the same Radisson that Mike and Marge reading at. And yeah, I don't know. I just think that's funny. But yeah, you know, Wade going there, the music's going, Logan is six shooter, it's amazing. They have a standoff. I gave simple fucking instructions. I love Buscemi's reaction. Who the fuck are you? I love it.
SPEAKER_00There, there's there there comes a point, and it's around now where where I take Carl's side on this whole entire thing. Like, like, because he's been through a lot. And and and I just sort of like, like, yeah, Carl, who the fuck? You like he's he like yes he put himself in this situation but then everything since then is that's like has happened outside of his realm of control and and he has to deal with it all and then yeah and then and and like yeah this is where we get some of the real violence of the movie is because basically he just fucking shoots Wade so and this go yeah that that goes back to our question has he ever killed anyone has he seen this level of violence or is this dude just so wound up and pissed off that he's fucking over it boom I think that's what it is I do too and then he fucking takes that fucking shot right to the fucking face I mean it is uh it is such a the the way that they shoot that because it it's like they use that flash like that really white like thing and that's where they cut and um so you don't actually see any of that, but there's something that's even more sort of like shocking about that, the way it's filmed, and then you see like the blood, and you like you're putting together that's a weird way that things like this work, is when it's not about necessarily the gruesomeness of it as much as you start putting things together, yeah. And you're like, oh shit, he shot him, but he just he missed him, and now his face is all fucked up. Oh man, yeah, and then presumably just unloads the whole rest of the gun out and then fucking kicks him.
SPEAKER_01You shot him like six times, yeah. Kick him for good measure, speeds out of the garage, almost runs into Jerry. What does Jerry do?
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, first of all, Bishem up at the fucking gate, he's gonna kill that poor bastard off screen. Yeah, but what does Jerry do? Jerry rolls up, sees the crime scene, Wade's car is there, and he pops the trunk. This is another thing that is intentionally left from us, but look, what does he do with Wade's body? Are we to assume that it's in his car for the rest of the movie? Like what maybe he dumped it somewhere, maybe, but we don't know. We've never seen that. He opens the trunk, and the next day we see him, he's walking inside. And Scotty from upstairs, what's going on? It's like Wade's car is probably still in the lot. Where's his body? We have to assume it's in the trunk, it's fucking hilarious. And it really, like, you know, again, gallows humor type of way, but it's it's Cohen Brothers' humor.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean, there's so many. I mean, I mean, we have what does he do with him? I mean, I'm surprised he just didn't just leave it and just be like, oh geez.
SPEAKER_01Oh, geez, yeah, he pulls up old geez, and then when he sees the dead parking garage lieutenant in the hood, you know, with the cameras going, and then you just see his eye. Uh, it's great. Again, very just it's simple. It's just a simple shot, but always very effective. So, yeah, that like great kind of standoff boom, and then we're gonna cut again. Now we get our final day of Fargo. This is day seven of Fargo, with my second favorite scene of the movie after Mikey Anagita, and that is the Mr. Morris scene. This scene is entirely in one take, and I would argue has maybe less to do at surface level with the movie than the Mikey Anagita thing, because we've only seen this other cop uh once in passing, he was in the buffet, so that's the only time we've seen him. He delivered that news, and maybe you know, around the police station, something like that. But now he's going up to this Mr. Mora, who we've never seen. And I just love this because it's very accurate to police investigations. These small tips they may seem like nothing, but when you put one small tip together, like a nervous, weird fella who's kind of funny looking in a bar, you just start adding all this stuff together, and you, you know, you give that, put it all in the pot in the case. But I love that that he is clearly this guy had a conversation with Carl Steve Buscemi off camera, and you know, I'm going crazy there at the lake, and and he just is a good guy, it just feels need, you know, Mrs. Mora. I love that he calls his wife Mrs. Mora, heard about the murders there, so I thought I'd call it in. So I called it in.
SPEAKER_00End of story. You know, it's a great it's it's a fantastic way creatively to get across plot and exposition to some degree. Um, because especially because now that we know these characters, when he's talking about and he's saying it and going crazy up at the lake, like we can put that together for ourselves in our imagination, and we kind of get it. And and this is like a great way to not have to shoot those scenes, and so you just need to kind of get across some bit of information, and but the best way to do it is to do it in a way where you've got this accent, you've got like you know, it just so happens that you know what makes this scene so funny for everyone watching it is just listening to this real from that town guy just talked in the way that he does. Because what you end up finding be entertaining is I don't I almost venture to say that people aren't even might be listening to what this guy's actually saying.
SPEAKER_01That's that's what I mean. This is what the cones are ingenious with doing over and over. You're you're making fun of the funny voice, the funny dialogue, you're looking at the buffet food, you're not really hearing all the details of the case, which is why it's so fun to rewatch. But yes, totally agree. Great. Another reveal, another scene that I love so much. We're back in the car, and now Carl realizes I have 920,000 more dollars in front of me than I ever expected. I love that. Jesus Christ, love that just looking at it. And then maybe my favorite silent, you know, dialogue-free scene in the entire movie when he goes when Carl goes out to futilely bury this shitload of money in the middle of nowhere against a fence that looks exactly the same for miles and miles in either direction. He marks it with a tiny ice scraper that will be covered by a few inches of snow in you know, in a matter of hours, presumably. And more importantly, this money will never be found again within the history of the story.
SPEAKER_00Yep, that's what makes it so great. It's gone, baby. Again, going into the little bit of the of the inside baseball of the filmmaking. Again, so much of this was used with artificial snow because the snow was literally melting as they were doing it. And then I love Deacons. He goes, you know, he goes, he goes, you know, the thing about you know, the take like this is uh one once you do it, you have to just keep moving down the bridge because all the snow, like yeah, the snow track. So he's like, so you just you keep moving down. He goes, I think we did this like six times. It works. Oh move the car and move the that.
SPEAKER_01I love it. It's such a good scene. But again, without it's not him like explaining. I mean, I think a lot of other filmmakers would have a throwaway line of dialogue that he says to himself, like, fuck, am I gonna be able to spot this again? Like, oh man, I think any other director would do that, but we just have to get it that he's looking like oh foot looks right, looks left, looks right. It's the exact same thing, buddy.
SPEAKER_00Oh man. And and I think and I think it works so well because I think, yeah, you you do actually have the camera that does actually turn to see all of that, and you do have Steve Bushimi who really does like get that across in his expression. But yeah, you're right. Any other director would probably kind of like add some sort of thing in there, but it works so well as it is.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, absolutely. And then next scene, Marge is talking with her phone, talking with her friend on the phone in the hotel room. Seemingly innocent enough, she's telling her friend about her lunch with Mike, and this is where we learn, along with Marge, that Mike uh kind of went crazy and he was never with Linda Cooksie. He in fact stalked her, never married her, never lost her to leukemia, and he kind of lost his mind. And I love Linda's fine, you should call her. Yeah, but even right then we're like, okay, so we're still just giving like all this extra stuff, this extra character detail. Next scene, Marge is in a car, she orders fast food, bam! Then something clicks. We see her driving, and something is clicked in her head, then and then she's gonna march immediately into the shop to question Jerry about the Tanciera. But that is the thing, that's what Mikey Anagita, this whole subplot has been for. That Marge, nice as she is, it should not be taking this twitchy used car salesman at his word. It does the Tan Sierra is from that lot. I know it is. The evidence points to that. Let's go back and press him. And she does, and she's stronger, sits down, more forceful. It's great scene with him. Like, there's no cause to get snippy with me, sir. I I just from I'll do a damn block count. Oh man, it's great. But that I'm cooperating. I'm cooperating here, and you know, here it all, here it all is. This is what the Mikey Anagita thing's been all about. That click, that realization. Not everyone is at face value. People are lying here. I love it. I love it. Yep, he's fleeing the interview. It's just great. We like see him drive. How do I get an outside line?
SPEAKER_00It's so great. Like her movement, too, is just sort of like, you know, like she's she's not gonna be like the person to chase him down. So she's like, Oh, he's fleeing the interview.
SPEAKER_01He's fleeing the interview. And she even asks, Do I need to call, you know, Wade? Like, do I need to get him on the phone here? And that's what all right, fine. I'll do a damn luck count. You darn tootin'. Uh now we're back at the safe house. This is you know, Garrett's just watching TV. That's old Bruce Campbell on the television soap opera there. Yes, it is. Yes, it is. And it just again, this is so Cohen's like Gene is just dead, right there. It's so coldly terrifying, yeah. How little attention is paid to this, and that that's really the tragedy of of the movie. And you know, oh, she just started shrieking, you know. It's the it's all that's paid to it. Like, that's it.
SPEAKER_00These crazy bastards, and and and again, this is where I agree with Carl. Like, you know, even though he's got a bunch more money, he's lying to him. You know, basically, here's your share.
SPEAKER_01I absolutely disagree with Carl in every instance here. I have so many notes. This car, this is exactly what I'm talking about. Carl he did all the work. Carl rushes in and is uh you should see the other guy, this and that. And basically, Gare is like, you know, they're gonna split the 80,000. I got it. All 80,000. So we're gonna split it 40 each. No, we split the car. How do you split a car, dummy? One of us pays the other for half. I did research on this. I don't I don't know if the car is used or new. I think it's used. The blue, like the blue book on this is not a lot, it's not a lot of money. We're talking about seven thousand dollars. The man has a million fucking dollars. You put up a little fight so that it's not suspect and like, well, then fine, who gets the car? I want the Sierra. Well, then how fucking much do you want? Seven grand. Let's say 10 max. You know, you do your Carl thing, you fucking asshole. You know, working with fine here, and you cut him off 10 grand, and then you leave and you go pick up your satchel of a million dollars. This is the dumbest thing I think Carl does in the movie. I do not agree with him at all. All you have to do, it's it's the whole it's the same thing about arguing with a guy over four dollars. You think you're about to make 80 grand, so who cares about four? You have a million in your possession, and now you're arguing with a dude about seven grand. That is idiotic.
SPEAKER_00This dude has done jack shit he's watched a woman and she started screaming, watched her, yeah, and then he killed her. And meanwhile, Carl murders someone and gets shot.
SPEAKER_01The argument is full of holes here because the man ends up with an axe to the face. Yeah, so if he would have that if he would have just kept his mouth shut just a little bit and not insulted the psycho blonde-haired baddie so much, he'd probably still be alive. So, uh, all that, all your frustration, all your frustration of I've done all the work here, everything. This guy is the one who's killed people. I mean, he did just kill Wade as well. All that you gotta let all that go. You gotta be thinking about that million, the the pot, the honey pot in the middle of the field, and the ice scraper marker. That's what you gotta be thinking of, but he can't. He's so everyone at this movie is just penning pinching pennies all the time, all the time. It is hilarious to me that he is arguing with him about a shitty used Tan Sierra, about splitting the cost of it, just carve out some dough and then walk away. That's it, but he can't. You mute, and boom, just another another great reveal of him rushing out, putting on his cab, just axing him in the face, and we're like, What? Thought these guys were like friends. Oh my god. Then immediately we're in the car, and Mara just cruising Moose Lake based on Mr. Mora's intel. Yeah, and then you know, spot that's the car, that's the car. Tan Sierra, she, and then we get now. I've never seen this in a movie before. I don't know anyone who had before this movie was made. The slow reveal for like walking to the back because we hear this machinery rumbling, and there's the wood chipper scared putting in fucking uh Carl's limbs one at a time. The leg won't go, so you get the block of wood to put her. Oh man. Oh my god. Just Marge's reaction, seeing it like police. He doesn't hear that. He does. She points to her cab, throws the log at her, it hits her leg, too. It's just great. It's another fantastically staged set piece. Brilliant.
SPEAKER_00And Deacons, too, is saying he goes, This is the only tracking shot in the whole movie, is what we're following Marge to get to him.
SPEAKER_01And it looks great, and just yeah, you know, he runs, she gets off two shots, clips him in the leg.
SPEAKER_00Yep.
SPEAKER_01And oh my god, I love it so. And then, yeah, the next scene is them in the damn car. She's driving him. The nicest, kindest person in this movie is driving the sickest bastard in the movie, and he doesn't have a damn word to say. And what was it all for? A little bit of money, and it's a beautiful day. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Back back to a question that I brought up in our uh main episode of something that I think the Coens are asking a lot in their work. What is it for? Yeah, what's it all about?
SPEAKER_01It's usually for a little money, and uh sometimes it's you know, sex is gone awry, but it's usually money and people trying to screw each other over. But look what happened, buddy. It's just the whole thing is hilarious. We finally get to see Jerry get his comeuppance squeaming like a little girl trying to run out of the grasp of the cops. He doesn't have pants on, he's in a shitty motel, right?
SPEAKER_00The only handheld shot.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, only and it works. That's it's good that it's handheld, and you know, he's I mean, that dude's done. Heck D me final scene: Marge in the bed, Marge and Norm in bed. Norm got the three cent stamp, and Marge puts a positive spin on it. There are no mentions of the murder and the wood chipper and the blood and the dead wife.
SPEAKER_00Nope.
SPEAKER_01And then the movie ends with Carter Burwell's gorgeous score, and that is the American masterpiece that is Fargo. 98 minutes total with credits, lights out, great film. Boom. Our our our whole entire deep dive was longer. Well, yeah, I mean, it's it does it deserves to be it sure does gone into for longer than 98 minutes a little bit. We'll talk a little bit about the legacy. I did mention, I think, on the main feed episode, that I mean, this is crazy. There is this lore that this Japanese woman saw the movie and believed that it was a true story, and believed that that money that Steve Buscemi's character buried there was still there. So she went and tried to find it. Kumoko the treasure hunter was a movie made in 2014 starring Rinko Kakuchi, and it's about this. It's there, it's a little fuzzy of like, was she did she actually believe it was there? But by all accounts, she kind of didn't. She, you know, went out looking for it and died in the woods. Like that actually happened. That's and so that it's not a it's not a bad movie. Of course, there was a Fargo TV show. I it was very popular. I love the first season with Billy Bob. I think the second season was the Kearson Dunce and Jesse Plements one. That was good. Yeah. Third, I'm losing a little bit of steam here, but I know I watched it. And fourth, I was just kind of out. I made it two episodes. That was the Chris Rock season. I think season five as John Hamm, and like it was that was, you know, usually there's like a season of the week of TV, and I remember that took over the culture for like a week and then went away. So, but I saw the first three seasons. I like the first two, love the first one. I actually watched season one twice because I think that's really good. But other than that, I kind of fell off it. Doesn't have much in common. I mean, it's loose.
SPEAKER_00No loose. But I I think that's the problem is like you're you're trying to kind of do like a true detective type thing where you're trying to kind of Yes, true detective light. Yeah, you're you're you're taking these ideas that are sort of around a similar thing, but then you're gonna, you know, each season is a new cast, and it's it's just another reason why TV sucks. Yeah, I mean TV. No offense to those well, but to the work. But yeah, like it's a great like honestly, I think the fur I think the Fargo like like I I didn't see the second season, I'm sure it is good, but I mean like it's over. I think having that one-off mini series is enough as terms of like let's do something fun uh as a spin-off to the movie, even though it's a completely different scenario and blah blah blah, but it's a fun little addition to it. But then we're gonna add more. Of course, they're gonna add more because the first season does so well, but now like now, like how much piss do we need to put into the soup before like people realize that oh, this tastes like pee. You know, I'm telling you know what I'm saying, dog. Come on, bark for me. Well, this isn't fight club. Go on, tell them.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yes, yes. I mean, I agree with all that. I did like the first season. I love Billy Bob. It makes a kind of fun narrative jump toward the end of the season where you would jump ahead and you don't know what's going on. You're like, oh, that's cool. I like that. Oscars for the motion picture Fargo, seven nominations, two wins. Joel and Ethan Cohen win best original screenplay. Frances McDormant wins her first of three best actress Oscars. It's an amazing speech. She literally struts to the podium, does like a mocking cowboy walk thing. It's amazing. She's hysterical. Nicholas Cage actually gave it to her. So, you know, you're kind of getting your you know, raising Arizona co-stars back. It loses best picture, director, cinematography, and best editing to the English patient. And it William H. Macy lost supporting actor to Cuba Gooding Jr. for Jerry McGuire. Tough year.
SPEAKER_00Okay, what are you watching? That was Fargo. What so what are we what are you saying you want me to go first?
SPEAKER_01For what are you watching? Yeah, what a stretch. I think you should take the lead on this one.
SPEAKER_00Well, I I I I was like, I have two, so I can go first. Well, I was thinking mine would be uh more of a discussion point because I feel like we're gonna have to talk about it on the pod at some point.
SPEAKER_01Alright, I don't know what you're talking about, so that's fine. So you want me to go first then? You know what I'm talking about?
SPEAKER_00I have no idea what you're talking about. I I was gonna say maybe we should talk about the end of Oak Street. Oh, like Do you feel like do you feel like being the movie, not just the end? I mean, um Yeah, like that would be my what are you watching, but I would say it in in more of like a discussion situation.
SPEAKER_01Uh yeah, we can. This would be a little better suited for Patreon, I think, but I can I mean you can give me your thoughts. Okay, all right, all right. We'll say we'll save it. We'll see. I I have a I have a different one. My like double feature, what are you watching? We've talked about it a lot on the pod, and I'm serious. Like, I am making it serious again because I think there's a legit double feature for Fargo. It was made two years later by their old friend Sam Raimi. It's Sam Raimi. It's called a simple plan, and it's the type of homegrown, hell yeah, cold-weathered, domestic thriller about a bunch of seemingly normal small town folk who get caught up in a crime involving money. It's a great film. It is my favorite Sam Raimi film. Bill Paxson is flawless in it. Rest in peace. Yes, Bridget Fonda is fantastic in it, one of her final roles before she retired from acting. And then, you know, two years earlier in 1996, same year as Fargo, Billy Bob Thornton skyrocketed to fame, playing a somewhat dim-witted, kind-hearted man in Slingblade. And his character in his simple plan is dim-witted and kind-hearted, but they are nothing alike. These characters are nothing alike. It is fantastic portrayals of these very distinct people. And Thornton, I mean, he steals the movie, he's great. He was nominated. James Coburn won that year for Affliction, another fantastic, homegrown, cold-weathered domestic thriller. Can't argue with that win, but yeah, go check out a simple plan. And then, you know, we were talking a little shit on the Fargo TV show a little bit. Uh, friend of the pod Taylor started watching The Shards on Hulu, which is based on Brett East and Illis's last book. The trailers gave me a headache. I thought it looked terrible. And he's like, uh, you know, just so give it a shot. Had a flight. First four episodes were out, downloaded the episodes, watched it. I'm a fan. It's Ryan Murphy doing itself. Are you really? Ryan Murphy's gonna do Ryan Murphy things and what the show does well. That I I was reading some reviews, and I think a lot of people don't necessarily get this, is that all of Brett Easton Ellis's works have a very detached style to them. Like just the narrator's like detached from things. He doesn't like really care. It's like, hey, whatever, man, it's all good. This is something that why Ellis has been a little critical of the American psycho movie because there's not that level of kind of detachment. Detachedness isn't really there. There's way more of it in the book. Rules of Attraction, but that movie gets it perfectly. You know, rock and roll. Just not giving a fuck about stuff. That's why he loves that. This has that. This has the characters have this detached tone of like, hey, whatever, it doesn't matter, even though crazy shit is happening around them. But yeah, it it is not a good show. It's trying to be like euphoria light. I'm I am rereading the novel now. I'm it I love that novel. It's very long, it's as long as book, but I'm getting close to the end, and it has like a doozy of the Shars by Brett Easton Ellis has a fucking doozy of a conclusion, let me tell you, and I'm really interested how the show handles it. But you know, it stars Cindy Crawford's daughter and Richard Gere's son. It's kind of cool. The guy playing Brett, young actor, he's good. He just he it's the type of thing where like everyone's talking like, you know, Southern California man, and he has a very he a very prominent British accent that he just can't hide. And he sounds uh all of his vows are just very, very British to me, but it's not bad. It's silly, it's a bit over the top, it's a Hulu show, but I'm a huge fan of the novel, so I'm enjoying my time with it. When it is done, I'll move on with my life. I don't think they would have a second season that would be idiotic because they're it's on it's on pace to end where the book ends. There, it's not in a literal, you know, adaptation. It's a long book, but it it's doing enough to where I'm like, all right, this is fun. It gets, you know, it's LA, it's the 80s, it's bright colors, drugs, sex, drinking, rock and roll. Wes Bentley's there. I like Wes Bentley. Evan Rachel Wood is there playing just uh out of her mind, you know, Hollywood social it hurts. It's great. So I that's you know, there's some fun shit. The shards, Hulu. All right, go watch Fargo, go watch a simple plan. This is my decision. Make sure you head on over to Patreon, W A Y W podcast.com is where you can find our website for all of your for all of your what are you watching needs. But as always, thanks for listening and happy watching. Heck do you mean it? Ha ha ha you did it too. Oh, you could have.
SPEAKER_03Let's find each other tonight. Everything will be alright. Don't hesitate now. Let's find each other tonight.
SPEAKER_01Hey everyone, thanks again for listening. Visit W AYW Podcast.com to write to us, donate if you're feeling generous, buy our new merch, and join our Patreon. What are you watching? Bonus features is available at patreon.com slash WAYW. For a few bucks a month, you'll get new uncut W AYW episodes. Visit WAYW Podcast.com for more. Yeah, be sure to head to Patreon.com slash WAYW for an uncut version of this episode, which does end with me trashing a brand new movie. I did not mean to do it, it just sort of happened. Next time, Cruising in Uritu have a new movie coming up. It's called Digger. It looks funny. I want to do a cruise primer deep dive before that. I don't know which movie. I gave a few choices to Nick and he hasn't responded to my text messages, which is quite common. Stay tuned.