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byneddiedingo · 2 years ago

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Oscar Isaac in Inside Llewyn Davis (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, 2013)

Cast: Oscar Isaac, Carey Mulligan, John Goodman, Garrett Hedlund, Justin Timberlake, Adam Driver, F. Murray Abraham, Stark Sands, Ethan Phillips, Robin Bartlett. Screenplay: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen. Cinematography: Bruno Delbonnel. Production design: Jess Gonchor. Film editing: Ethan Coen, Joel Coen.

The flashback is a time-honored storytelling device in movies, but if virtually the entire film is a flashback, the device better have a purpose for its existence. In Sunset Blvd. (Billy Wilder, 1950), for example, the film flashes back to tell us whose corpse is floating in that swimming pool and why. Inside Llewyn Davis starts with Davis (Oscar Isaac) performing in a Greenwich Village club, then being beaten up for some unknown offense by a man outside that club. The film then flashes back to several days in the life of Davis in which, among other things, he becomes encumbered with a cat, learns that a woman (Carey Mulligan) he knows is pregnant and wants him to fund an abortion, travels to Chicago to try to find a well-paying gig, tries to give up his music career and rejoin the Merchant Marine, and then finally returns to the night he performed at the club and was beaten up, whereupon we learn that he had cruelly heckled his attacker's wife the night before. Is there a meaning to this method of storytelling? If there is, it's probably largely to make the point that Davis is caught in a vicious circle, a spiral of depression and self-destructive behavior. Llewyn Davis is a talented folk musician in a business in which talent alone is not enough: As the Chicago club-owner (F. Murray Abraham) tells him after he performs a song from the album Davis is trying to push, "I don't see a lot of money here." Davis doesn't want a lot of money, just enough to pay for his friend's abortion (which it turns out he doesn't need) and to stop couch-surfing, but every time he is on the verge of making it, something rises up to thwart him. In the movie's funniest scene he goes to a recording gig to make a novelty song, "Please Please Mr. Kennedy," which his friend Jim (Justin Timberlake) has written about an astronaut who doesn't want to go into space -- or as Al Cody (Adam Driver), the other session musician, intones throughout the song, "Outer ... space" -- but he signs away his rights to residuals because he needs ready cash. Of course, the song becomes a huge hit. As unpleasant as Davis can often be, his heart is really in the right place: Not only does he agree to fund his friend's abortion, even though the baby may not be his, he conscientiously looks after the cat he accidentally lets out of the apartment where he has been sleeping, and when the cat escapes again he nabs it on the street -- only, of course, to find out that the cat he has picked up is the wrong one. Are the Coens telling us something about good deeds always being punished? Are they telling us anything that can be reduced to a formula? I think not. What they are telling us is that life can be like that: random, unjust, bittersweet. And that, I think, is enough, especially when the lesson is being taught by actors of the caliber of Isaac (in a star-making role), John Goodman (brilliant as usual, this time as a foul-mouthed junkie jazz musician), and a superbly chosen supporting cast. The Coens always take us somewhere we didn't know we wanted to go, but are glad they decided to take us along.

#Inside Llewyn Davis #Joel Coen #Ethan Coen #Oscar Isaac

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marc-spectorr · 2 years ago

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Hi Callie! 🦜

Omgosh I’ve been meaning to type out a response while at work but it’s been really busy.

I watched Inside Llewyn Davis and I feel like the fandom pariah….I mean I didn’t NOT like it but I didn’t like it as much as I thought I would. Honestly, Oscar really carried that film. I feel like everyone else was a little static. But Omgosh I think it hit a little too close to home for me?? Him just spending the whole movie trying so hard and people just being so freakin mean to him just reminded me of myself and the constant hope of “maybe it’ll be different this time” only to have my hope drop at the next scene was heavy for me. Maybe one day I’ll rewatch it again when I’m a little less sad and it’ll watch differently? Also watched it with my mom and it wasn’t her type of movie so maybe if I watched it by myself I would pick up on more? Idk 🤷🏻‍♀️

BUT I heard you watched the Force Awakens?? What did you think?? I’ve rewatched the scene where Finn and Poe escape in the tie fighter like SO MANY TIMES. I just love Poe so damn much 🥹💕

And yes definitely watch At Eternity’s gate. I have a feeling you’ll love it 🥰

And to the other anon who was talking about The Promise (I meant to look before I started typing…I think it was 🦋?? Sorry! 🤦🏻‍♀️) I didn’t realize how deep the history went….dude just finally finding a trailer of it on YouTube where the comments WERENT disabled?? Whoa…..I feel like watching it is sticking it to the people who even denied it happened and that’s more than enough reason for me.

Callie, how’s your week been?? I hope it treated you well! 💕 💐

Oh and I’m eastern standard time. I’ve been keeping up with your posts even though I haven’t been able to respond. Lol I do have a bit of insomnia so sometimes it doesn’t matter when I see your posts. It could be the afternoon, it could be 2 in the morning 😂

Random question, besides writing, what else do you like to do? Do you have any hobbies?

Cheers! -🦜Birdy 💖

heeeeey birdyyy 🦜💚 (also love the nickname btw haha i wanted to come up with a good one for you too like the others)

:o oOo thanks for sharing what you thought about it! honestly i know these movies are going to be a hit or miss. you’re bound to watch something that’s a big ehh while binging on your fave actor’s entire filmography LOL (the things we do for oscar). i’ll give each one a fair shot tho. but anyway back to llewyn,,, :((( people are mean to him?? gosh my heart can’t cope. who would ever want to be mean to someone with a sweet face like his 🥺 if you decide to rewatch it, let me know if your feelings are any different! i think i have this one scheduled for the week after hehe. it got pushed back since i binged on star wars this week.

speaking of star wars.,,, yEP I SAW THE FORCE AWAKENS. AND THE LAST JEDI AND RISE OF SKYWALKER. all i can think of right now is POE POE POE. especially his scenes in the last film??? i think ima need to watch it again tonight just bc 🥲 uGHH but i cant wait to write for him soon skksksk.

my week has been good! busy as always but what’s new lmaoao. ive been super tired too so that’s why ive been slacking on writing recently /: it’s not that i don’t want to write, i just don’t have the energy to do it which makes me madddd. and omggg!! fellow EST here too haha! so cool knowing we live in the same side of the world haha.

as for other hobbies, i love cooking!!! i also love playing video games, traveling and exploring new places. tbh i haven’t done much of those tho since i’m always at work but i’m hoping to find time soon 🥺 what about you birdy? what are your hobbies :))

thanks for stopping by sweetie. ttyl ilyyyy 💗

#asks #🦜 anon

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waatermelon-sugaar · 4 years ago

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Nice Eyes

Gif by @santiagogarcia

Words = 1.3k

Summary = Llewyn talks in his sleep

Warnings = None! Like actually none

Edit 24/02: Gender neutral reader!

A/N = Prompt no. 50 requested by @aellynera as part of my 300 follower celebration, thanks so much, hope you like it! Prompt is “Did you know you talk in your sleep?” “No …” “You’ve got nice eyes too.” W/ Llewyn and bolded in text

Posted to AO3

Masterlist

***

Llewyn had always talked in his sleep.

You knew, because you’d get up before he did, running for a shower in the cool light of dawn and taking care not to stand on the creaky floorboards in your living room.

You’d jumped the first time he did it, a towel wrapped under your arms as you walked to the bathroom when he’d mumbled behind you, stretched across your sofa. It wasn’t the first time he’d stayed the night, and you’d frozen in shock, trying to calm the pattering of your heart, eyes wide.

He didn’t say anything else, only the occasional soft snore leaving him. After another moment, you’d ducked into the bathroom, turning the shower on, grinning under the warm water at how cute he was.

Llewyn would stay with you often, although you wished he’d do it more, just so you could be sure he had a roof over his head and warm food in his belly. You worried about him.

You understood though, the awkwardness that comes from constantly asking your friends for favours, even if they wanted to help. And some of Llewyn’s friends didn’t want to help.

And so, every couple of weeks, you would try and walk through your apartment quietly, going about your morning routine trying not to wake Llewyn up. You wanted him to rest, he always looked exhausted, but you supposed that came with sleeping on a sofa every night.

You’d once tried to convince him to share the bed with you, only to find that Llewyn almost impulsively denied himself comfort. You’d dropped it, not wanting it to turn into an argument, but it was something you revisited in your mind often. Why would he choose the sofa?

You’ve become used to his sleep talking, his gruff voice filling the chilled air, sometimes it’s your name, or a swear, once a line from his new song. You try not to think into it too much, you know dreams don’t mean anything.

You never said anything because you like it. You like the sound of his voice and you don’t want to say anything because you don’t want him to be self-conscious about it. And how can you say that you like to hear him talk in his sleep because you like the sound of his voice without sounding like a creep?

You can’t, so you don’t.

It doesn’t help that over time you find yourself developing a crush on him.

And then one night, both of you are crammed into your tiny kitchen; you’re cooking, while Llewyn puts away plates which have been drying on your washboard.

And you turn, looking for a spoon to taste, when Llewyn’s there, and his face is so close to yours, eyes dark, and you can’t stop looking at his lips, mouth dry while you imagine what his beard would feel like when something spits on the stove with surprising ferocity, breaking the brief spell.

The two of you turn back, Llewyn placing the glass he was holding in your cupboard while you look at the food, mind blank for the second. Your breath is shallower and you’re warmer than you were before, and the food is nearly ready, and what were you doing before? You wanted … something.

The rest of dinner passes as normal, the familiar domesticity of it breaking through that strange tension that had existed for a brief second. There’s a flare of … something warm in your chest everytime you catch his eyes, but you talk about his plans for the rest of the week, what you’re going to do on your day off tomorrow, the film you saw last week, and gradually, gradually, you manage to calm yourself down.

Llewyn’s got a dry sense of humour and you meant it when you said you liked his voice. You could listen to him tell stories all day, although sometimes you think it unnerves him to have your full attention.

***

You wake up naturally the next day, the silence a relief from your usual alarm. You groan when you turn over, the clock showing that it’s still early. Squeezing your eyes tight shut you try in vain to get back to sleep, but you know it’s not going to work.

Grabbing your towel, you sneak across your apartment, pausing by Llewyn to cover his shoulders with the blanket when you hear your name. You freeze, your heart sounding incredibly loud in the sudden silence when Llewyn mumbles something else.

You don’t breathe as you step away, exhaling in the safety and privacy of the bathroom. There is no way you just heard that. You’ve got pretty eyes. You try your hardest not to imagine his dreams, in what situation would he have been complimenting you like that?

And there’s always been something between you and Llewyn, you’d have to be blind not to see it, but you didn’t want to act on it for fear of driving him away. What if he didn’t feel comfortable asking for your sofa after, and you never saw him again?

Especially after he didn’t want to sleep in the same bed as you.

You’d rather spend your time exchanging longing glances, waiting for his knock on your door as he hauls his guitar up your stairs, waiting for that half-smile which he thinks’ll convince you to let him stay. Not that you need convincing.

The shower’s wonderfully warm in comparison to the cold morning air of your apartment, so you find yourself spending a minute or two longer than you should, delaying the inevitable.

When you step out, dressed for a day where you won’t leave the house, you’re surprised to see Llewyn is blinking himself awake, a slightly dopey look on his face, messy curls falling into his eyes.

“Did you know you talk in your sleep?” The question is blurted out before you can stop it, and as Llewyn blinks up at you, propping his head on his elbow, you find yourself stepping closer to the sofa.

“No?” His response is a question, his voice still hoarse from sleep, but clearer than his mumbled words were.

And suddenly you can’t help yourself. Maybe it’s the mild terror suddenly flaring in his eyes, his mind flashing through his dreams as he wonders what he was dreaming about, what he said. And you want to put him out of his misery, reassure him he didn’t do anything wrong, the words coming out before you can stop them. “Well. You have nice eyes too.”

And then you duck down and kiss his cheek, a quick graze of his soft beard with your cheek. And you’re stepping away, suddenly, inexplicably aware that maybe you’re too much, too keen, reading into things too much, when Llewyn’s grabbed hold of your wrist.

His hand is warm, strong, and you can feel the callouses from his guitar on your skin. You let out an involuntary squeak as he pulls you back to him as he sits up a little, and your hand is flying to his cheek and you’re still bending at a weird angle, but you’re kissing Llewyn Davis.

He’s tentative at first, keeping his hand firmly on your wrist, and you let out another sound as you move to sit on the edge of the sofa, your thighs touching his waist, hidden under the blanket.

Nipping at his bottom lip, you swoon inside at the moan of appreciation Llewyn makes for you as he opens his mouth, your tongues brushing against each other.

You’re suddenly very glad you have the day off.

***

Thanks for reading! Reblog and comments mean the world to me 🥰🥰🥰

#llewyn Davis x reader #llewyn x reader #llewyn davis #inside llewyn davis

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userpoe · 3 years ago

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Inside Llewyn Davis for the movie asks? 👀

very tempted to borrow the elevator pitch for the movie my friend gave me for this first question but

• what’s the movie about?

one depressed smartass musician and the no good, horrible, very bad, terrible week (and, to a much lesser degree, the hazards of trying to deal with a very stubborn cat) • do I like the movie?

yeah, it was a good movie! I think - this is definitely an unpopular opinion - it's not one i'd rewatch a whole lot unless it was with a friend, but i enjoyed it! • favourite character?

the cat llewyn • least favourite character?

i can't really remember really having a strong opinion on any of the other characters, to be honest. • first impressions?

i found it...strangely soothing? like it's obviously not a lighthearted film by any means, but there is this nice kind of calmness to it that made it very enjoyable to me. • did I like the ending?

yeah, I think it fit pretty well with the overall tone of the movie and it was more of a gut-punch by the end of everything else that happened, circling back to that performance. • how many times have I seen it?

just the one time, so far! • which character would I be?

...i related the most to llewyn. especially with the line about being tired all the time, but also trying to find a way to keep at the thing you're passionate about (or lose your spark for it) when there's nothing but setbacks coming your way. i can also be rudely sarcastic the way he can when i'm stressed out...so, not in a lot of ways I particularly like. • *extra comments/opinions*

it took me like...two or three months after watching the movie and saving some of the songs to spotify to realize oscar sings a song with marcus mumford on the soundtrack, and the only reason I realized this is cause i wasn't paying attention and when the song started i was like "oh hey i don't remember this mumford and sons son- wait a minute that's oscar isaac singing too what"

send me a movie!

#ask box #acedameron

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freelancearsonist · 4 years ago

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Good Morning

Llewyn Davis x fem!Reader

Rated MA for graphic sexual content and use of language

1,445 words

A/N: I’m back! Technically I never left, but it seems I have recovered from my writer’s block, so here’s a little fic for my favorite curly-haired folk singer. As always, feedback would be greatly appreciated :)

The morning sun is nearly blinding as you roll over, trying desperately to scrabble at the last dregs of sleep. No such luck, though—you’re awake now, and there’s no changing that fact.

You’re not very tempted to fall back asleep, anyway, because you hear the soft sound of guitar strings being strummed in the living room.

He’s awake.

You stretch your arms over your head as you swing your legs over the edge of the bed, the cool air making the light hair on your skin stand up. You scrabble to find something to cover your naked body, and the first thing your fingers meet is Llewyn’s plain white shirt. You pull it over your head, surrounded by his familiar sweet scent. The fabric is soft and a bit worn, and you make a mental note to buy him new shirts. Especially because you plan on keeping this one now that it’s on your body.

He’s in the living room, perched on your slightly lumpy and uneven couch, guitar in his arms and legs spread. He always sits like that, and you always make fun of him for his wide posture. You can’t blame him, though; you know from first-hand experience that he’s got the junk to justify the way he spreads his legs when he sits.

He’s absolutely beautiful like this. You love it when he gets all dressed up and gorgeous for photoshoots and sets, but this is your favorite version of him. Hair messy from the night before, shirtless, wearing only a pair of boxers. The music calls to him in these moments, after the two of you have made love, and he always answers the call. He slips out of your tight, sleepy grip and grabs his guitar, fingers soft on the strings so he doesn’t wake you. He hasn’t outrightly admitted it, but you’re his muse. The first and the only woman he’s truly written songs about.

The sun penetrates the drawn curtains, casting small portions of light into the living room and over his golden skin. He looks ethereal, godly. You’re sure he is.

His sleepy eyes meet yours as you approach, and you watch the gulp move down his throat as his eyes trace over your form in his shirt and down your bare legs. Still, his gaze is soft, and he opens his mouth to speak but you press a finger to your lips and nod your head to his guitar. Respect your inspiration, you tell him without actually speaking a word.

You walk slowly as he continues playing. You’re one of the only people he’s ever let hear his “practice shit”, and you’ll always be eternally grateful for that. You think this is when he’s at his best—well-fucked and mindlessly strumming with no real goal in mind. He’s always good, but these are your favorite moments to listen to him in.

You drop to your knees in front of him, your hands just barely ghosting up and down his thighs as your lips make contact with the inside of his knee. He gulps again but continues playing, intrigued to see where this early morning will take the two of you.

Somewhere good, he hopes. Although mornings with you are always good.

“Good morning,” you whisper, hot breath fanning against the sensitive skin of his thigh. He almost recoils from the ticklish sensation, but simultaneously leans into your affection. He’ll take anything, everything you’re willing to give to him.

You can see his cock hardening through the thin, worn fabric of his boxers. He’s gone so long without passionate, affectionate gestures that even the slightest touches from you can get him going. Not that you’re complaining—you’re every bit as starved for him as he is for you.

He shifts slightly, hips pushing forward to give you better access, leaning his shoulders further back into the couch. Your couch isn’t the most uncomfortable piece of furniture he’s inhabited, but he certainly doesn’t miss sleeping on it. Your bed is a hell of a lot more comfortable. He hasn’t woken up with a sore back in a long time thanks to you.

You decide to tease him a little bit more, trailing your kisses further up the inside of his thighs. They’re one of his most sensitive areas, and you absolutely love lavishing them with the attention that they’ve gone so long without.

“Angel-“

You shush him and nod to the guitar again, indicating that he needs to continue playing. He starts a new song, something you’ve heard before that’s become muscle memory to his fingers, and you decide to finally take pity on him.

Your fingers brush gently against the tent in his boxers, and you don’t miss the low grunt he lets out at the limited friction. He whines when you pull his cock out of his boxers, red and leaking and desperate for your touch. And since he’s being so good, you reward him with a few slow, firm strokes.

“Fuck—“ he gasps, fingers faltering on the strings. You immediately release him, a playfully stern look in your eyes.

“You stop, I stop,” you warn him, proud of how unintentionally sexy your voice is when it’s gravelly from recently waking up.

“ Okay, okay,” he pants, already halfway undone. He continues playing, hands a little shaky, but still not sounding unpracticed.

This time you take him in your mouth, licking delicately around his tip and then from the very base to the head. His hips stutter towards you when you pull back for a second, but his fingers don’t stall again. He wouldn’t dare stop now that he knows the rules of this little game.

He looks even better from this angle. Mouth agape, head thrown back, eyes closed as you pleasure him with a combination of sensation from your mouth and your hand. His hips jolt every few moments, chasing after your grip and twitching with the pleasure coursing through his veins.

“Angel, I—“

“I’ve got you,” you interrupt him gently. “Just keep playing. Let me make you come.”

He moans at your words, mumbling an incoherent “thank you” for always taking such good care of him. He always thanks you, even though you’re far past that as a couple. All you want to do is make him feel loved and happy. If you can do that for even five minutes, you’ve done your job.

You can always tell when he’s about to come—he squeezes his thighs just a little tighter against you and he fidgets and moans to beat the band. The sounds he makes are beautiful—arguably more beautiful than his music, and his music is some of the most heavenly sounds you’ve heard.

He forgets to continue playing when you grip a little tighter on his shaft and take him as deep as you can, but since his cum is spilling into your mouth, you allow him to throw away the rules for a moment. He tastes amazing, warm and thick and exactly what you needed on this sleepy, sunny morning.

“Fuck,” he gasps again, hips still rocking idly as you let him rest deep in your mouth while he comes down. “You’re incredible.”

“Comes to me naturally for the man I love,” you laugh softly before gently tucking him away and licking your lips. “Good morning.”

“It certainly is,” he chuckles softly, breathlessly. He sets his guitar into the open case on the floor next to where you kneel, and then he gently grabs your arms and pulls you into his lap. His lips are warm and wet, melding perfectly with yours, and he moans at the salty tang of him that remains in your mouth.

“Jesus, angel,” he gasps as you pull back for air. “Thank you for that. I owe you one.”

“You don’t owe me anything, you sweet, beautiful man,” you smile softly as his head falls to your chest. You run your fingers tenderly through his gorgeous, disheveled curls as his hands grab onto your ass and pull you as tightly to him as possible. “I love making you feel good. I love you.”

“I love you too,” he whispers, pressing his lips carefully to your breast through his thin white shirt. “But I do owe you. And I’m pretty hungry for breakfast.”

And then he flips you—lays you back on the couch and settles between your legs. He lavishes attention to your breasts even through the fabric, swiping his warm tongue over your peaked nipples and sending a shiver down your spine.

He groans when he sees your lack of panties, a calloused thumb gently swiping through your soaked folds. “Let me repay the favor, Mrs. Davis.”

THE END

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#llewyn davis #llewyn davis imagine #llewyn davis fanfiction #llewyn davis smut #llewyn davis x reader #llewyn davis x you #llewyn davis x y/n #inside llewyn davis #oscar isaac #oscar isaac characters #cece writes

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aellynera · 4 years ago

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Don’t Forget the Napkins (Llewyn Davis x Reader)

DON’T FORGET THE NAPKINS

Word count: 2733(ish)

Warnings: Just a little bit of language, really (I mean, it’s Llewyn, so...) Like one sentence about Pappi’s creepy tendencies.

(with prompts: “Call me now, it’s urgent”; “Have you lost your mind”; and “So...can we go eat?”)

Another Saturday night at the Gaslight. There was nothing odd about that, it was where you spent pretty much every Saturday night for the past year and half, working behind the bar and waiting on the tables out by the stage when needed. Sure, it was dark, smoky, and kind of dingy, but it helped make ends meet and you got to listen to music for free.

The music is what you had first come to the Gaslight for, right after you graduated from college and moved to the big city. You loved the music and started coming in every chance you got, no matter who was on stage, just to sit in the room in the moment and experience the music. Pappi had taken a shine to you, said you reminded him of his little sister. You had no idea if he really had a sister, nor did you care, but it was certainly less creepy than Pappi telling you it was because he wanted to fuck you, so you let it slide. You had heard him make the latter suggestion to more performers than you cared to admit, but he was a decent boss and you got on well at the job, so it all worked out.

You had majored in English and wanted to be a famous writer, maybe even write some songs that people would talk about and still sing years from now, so where else would you go other than New York City? That’s where the culture was. That’s where the art scene was. That’s where the nightlife and bright lights and intellectuals were. And that’s also where Llewyn Davis was.

Llewyn. Now there was a riddle wrapped in an enigma inside a mystery.

You had seen him perform quite a few times at the Gaslight, and even bought his record when it came out. You talked to him just about every time he was there, because he always sat at the bar both before and after he performed. He had seemed quiet at first; well, he still did, really, but by now you knew the right combination of idle chit-chat, soft smiles, and whiskey straight up to get him to drop the first line of defense. Once that happened, he would talk to you all night. And if you weren’t busy, you’d let him. At some point, you had told him about your dreams of writing and creating songs that people wanted to sing (there was no way you were going to sing them yourself, at least not in public; your stage fright was too monumental and soul crushing). He had just looked at you thoughtfully for a moment, pushing one of his perfect dark curls off his face, then finished his drink and went up on the stage. When he came back, he ordered another drink and started up random conversation again. Then the night was over.

And that was his mystery - he spoke of many things, but he never really told you anything. You had an easy back and forth, a friendship even, but it felt like he never let on more than the bare minimum.

But the night after you had told him about the songwriting, you had come in to work and there was a note for you behind the bar. Two lines, scribbled on a napkin. You read them a few times and realized it was maybe the beginning of a poem...or lyrics. So you quickly wrote two more lines, and when Llewyn came in that night, you walked up to him and stuck the folded napkin in his pocket. He looked surprised, but you caught the slight upturn of his lips a few minutes later when he took it out, looked at it, and then carefully put it back in his pocket.

The next night, the napkin was back. Two more lines. So you added two more. The same thing the next day. And the next, and the day after that. It kind of became your thing, without anything else ever being said about it. Sometimes there was a whole verse written out and you would start a chorus, and vice versa. Once it was one word at a time and that had honestly gone off the rails pretty quickly, but it was fun.

And it had been going on for just about a year. You saw it as a mental game to keep your writing sharp and your brain engaged and your friend entertained. He certainly did more than his fair share in entertainment from his stool on the stage.

So when you got to work that night, it wasn’t a surprise to find another napkin meticulously folded and placed behind the bar where you normally stowed your pocketbook and keys. The place was more packed than usual, but there was some new guy named Dylan or something that was playing and there was a lot of buzz around him. So that was normal too. Smiling to yourself, you picked up the napkin and read the familiar scrawl.

Call me now, it’s urgent.

That was..not normal. Your face scrunched up in confusion, you quickly looked up and caught the mop of dark curls hunched over at the end of the bar. Grabbing a clean bar towel and the bottle of his favorite whiskey, you made your way over.

“Oh...good, you got my message,” he said, raising his eyes ever so slightly to meet yours over the rim of his tumbler. They were (beautiful and dark and compelling and soft and…) sort of glassy and red around the edges and maybe a little bloodshot? And was that a smirk inching its way onto his lips? You sighed.

“You’re sitting right here, Llewyn,” you said, taking the glass from his hand and refilling it without him asking. You pushed it back to him. “So thank you for saving me the dime.”

He snorted. “Come on, it was...a little funny, right?”

You shook your head, but you couldn’t keep your own small smile off your face. Did he realize the irony that you wouldn’t have been able to call him anyway, since you never really knew where he would be staying? “And you’re a little pissed already, huh? Isn’t it a bit early for that?”

“Nah, not really. And I’m not drunk. I am alcoholically reinforced,” he took another sip of his drink.

“...what does that even mean?”

He shook his head, that one particular curl flopping over his forehead and into (those beautiful, soulful, deep, enchanting…) his eyes. He totally ignored your question. “So, uh, look,” he started, suddenly seeming a bit more unsure of himself. “I really wanted to ask you, if…”

“No, you cannot borrow my couch tonight, Llewyn. My sister is in town.” You idly wiped at the bar top with your towel, raising an eyebrow at him.

For a split second he looked offended, but it was so brief you almost missed it. “What? No, no, I don’t need a place to...look, I just needed to tell you...well, ask you really, but also tell you…”

“Hey, Llewyn!” Pappi’s voice suddenly boomed from the other side of the room. “Lay off the help and get your ass up on stage! You’re not gettin’ half the basket just to sit here and drink all my booze!”

Llewyn sighed. “Yeah, yeah, all right,” he yelled back. His attention turned back to you. “So, listen, really though I need to…”

You swatted at him with the towel. “You need to finish that glass and get up there before we both get in trouble, is what you need to do. It looks like it’s gonna be a crazy night, I’ll catch you after, yeah? We’ll go grab a burger at that place down the block, my treat.” You flashed him a grin as you walked away before he could say anything else. And by say anything else, you really meant say no, because that man needed to eat a good, hot meal. As usual.

Llewyn watched you walk off and start tending to other patrons, then threw back the rest of his glass in one gulp. “Fuck,” he muttered under his breath as he walked to the stage. “Please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me…”

As Llewyn picked up his guitar and got himself situated, you filled drink orders and watched him as you did so. It was getting harder to deny that he was the most beautiful man you had ever seen, especially when he was up there, under the single spotlight and surrounded by the smoky haze of the crowd and his own cigarette smoke. There was just something about him. But the puzzle and mystery and enigma hung over everything and you were fairly certain you’d never crack the actual code, so you just let your crush be a crush. It was part of what made the Gaslight worth it, after all.

The night went on, busy and loud and musical. This particular crowd was really getting into his set and you couldn’t help but feel proud of him. He deserved the attention, and you knew he wanted it, even if he liked to pretend he didn’t. After a few songs, you took a pint glass of water up to the stage. It was something you always did for performers, but especially for Llewyn (since he tended to drink more than his fair share of whiskey in the meantime). You were about halfway to the stage when he strummed a few notes and started to introduce his next song.

“So, uh...well, this is a new song for me,” he started, noticing you coming his way. “And I didn’t really plan on doing this until maybe about an hour or so ago, but well...I dunno, sometimes when something just feels right, it’s right, you know?” His eyes meet yours as you set the glass on the small table next to him on the stage, and he momentarily seems to search for the next words.

“Y’know I usually work alone, but, uh, I wrote this next song with a friend. A good friend. Someone who is really talented and good with words, better with words than I am. And...and she doesn’t know I’m doing this but I’ll ask for forgiveness later.” He chuckled and the crowd did too in response.

Llewyn cleared his throat. “So, yeah. This is a song I wrote with the help of a lovely lady you probably all know. If you do, ask her to make you a drink, and if you don’t, well, go back to the bar and introduce yourself.”

You were almost to the back of the room, back to said bar, when your eyes shot wide and you spun on your heel to face the stage. Oh no, he did not just...did he? It’s kind of hard to clearly see his face from back here with the light and the glare in the smoke but you could swear that jerk is grinning, like full on guilty smiling, and in that instant you swore if you weren’t working and there weren’t so many people shoved into this space you might go up there and actually punch him. Your face was on fire and your stomach felt like it was going to drop out the bottoms of your feet. Your mouth dropped open before you could stop it.

Every pair of eyes in the room suddenly turned on you. There were maybe a hundred people there? Around that many. A hundred people times two and that’s how many eyes were suddenly staring right at you. There was only one pair of eyes you really cared about, though.

You managed to catch Llewyn’s eyes for a moment and you mouthed at him - Have you lost your mind? He shrugged slightly, closed his eyes, and started playing his...your...song.

It was beautiful. From the second line you recognized the napkin it had come from, one that got passed back and forth about four months ago, during a particularly cold week when it didn’t quite snow but the rain was still frozen. It was a back and forth about two people realizing they were in love but being too afraid and preoccupied and aloof to do or say anything about it. Typical unrequited love stuff. But oh, suddenly, oh now it had much more meaning. You listened, and watched, from the corner behind the bar, transfixed and unable to look away as every emotion you knew and some you never knew existed washed over you in time with the notes from the guitar and Llewyn’s gorgeous voice.

Once the song ended, you somewhat got your bearings and turned back to the bar. People were already coming over to tell you how beautiful the song was, ask if you really wrote it with Llewyn Davis, tell you how much they enjoyed it, ask if you had written any others...you were only vaguely aware of most of it and managed to pour some drinks and answered things as best you could, until finally one voice broke through all the others.

“So. Um. Did you like it?”

You closed your eyes for a minute, biting your lip. “Llewyn...I...what just happened?”

He looked down for a second, then reached over and took the glass you were holding and the bar towel out of your hands. He gently wrapped his fingers around yours, giving you a light squeeze. He didn’t say anything for a few more seconds, but when you didn’t pull away, he continued, “I tried to tell you...shit, I kept every single one of those napkins since we started doing that, and I turned some of ‘em into a song and wanted to play it tonight. I tried, but...well...fuck, you’re not mad at me are you?”

You weren’t mad. God, you were anything but mad at this man. Stunned, and surprised, yes, but definitely not mad. He kept all those napkins? You’d always half-wondered what happened to them, but never really gave it much thought, but you hadn’t really expected that to be the answer. Your brain still couldn’t quite process your own words correctly, so you just shook your head no and squeezed his hands in return.

Llewyn let out a huge sigh of relief. “Oh, thank fuck. For a few minutes there I thought I really fucked things up.”

You finally got your head back straight and laughed. “No, you didn’t,” you smiled. You cocked your head to the side and studied his face for a moment. “I still can’t quite figure you out, but you definitely did not fuck anything up.”

“Good,” he nodded. He lifted your fingers to his lips and brushed his lips along your knuckles, suddenly pulling away when Pappi snorted from his corner of the bar. You both turned to him, scowls on your faces, and Llewyn whipped the bar towel at Pappi’s head.

“So...can we go eat?” Llewyn asked, turning his attention back to you and ignoring Pappi’s continued string of bemused and somewhat lewd sounds.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Eat. Y’know, burgers? At that joint down the street? You said something earlier about buying me dinner?” Llewyn asked dryly.

You rolled your eyes. “Seriously? You sing me a song that I helped you write, and then you expect me to buy you dinner.”

“Well, you did offer.”

You bit your lip again as your smile grew wider and a blush crept further up your face. “Okay. But make sure you don’t lose these, we’re going to need them.” You grabbed a few pens from underneath the bar before coming around to his side and shoving them in Llewyn’s coat pocket.

“Okay, sure? But what are those for?” he asked, slipping and arm around your waist and leading you to the door.

“Because,” you replied, your tone implying that he should already know, “there are a lot of napkins floating around that place.”

Llewyn pulled you a little closer and you smiled into his embrace. “Ohhhhh.”

“And Llewyn?”

“Yeah?”

“I wasn’t kidding about the couch, my sister really is in town. But I’ve got a much more comfortable place you can stay tonight.”

~end~

#oscar isaac #inside llewyn davis #llewyn davis #llewyn davis x reader #llewyn davis x you #prompt fic #fluff

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clonecaptains · 5 years ago

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A Different Kind of Music - a Llewyn Davis x reader fic

rating: T - future M

a/n: this movie has become a comfort movie for me - and im emotionally attached to him so this was just a chance to write some of my emotions out. it’s self indulgent~

A Different Kind of Music

Your mouth drops open in disbelief. Emotion wells up in your heart, your chest feels tight and all the feelings have nowhere to go but in tears down your cheeks. Your hand comes to rest over your heart as if that would somehow heal the ache.

You’re at the Gaslight, and Llewyn Davis’s beautiful melancholy voice is tugging at your heartstrings. You knew his voice was lovely, that’s why you’ve come. To hear him sing, and to see him in person. Nothing could pull your attention from him singing. His mop of curls bounce as he sways slightly. His guitar rests on a thick thigh, and you blush. You’re even entranced by the veins on his neck – showing his passion as he sings.

He’s even more beautiful than the album cover suggests.

Yes, you have his album.

Inside Llewyn Davis.

It was a random find at a record store, there was a whole box of them untouched. You’d just begun to work at this little shop, and when the shipment came in you wondered by no one was buying it. You took one home and gave it a listen, and you’ve hardly listened to anything since.

So, when you heard he was going to sing at the Gaslight, you jumped at the chance.

Once his set was over, you anxiously got up from your seat to follow him. He walked up to the bar to speak to someone, then he went outside. You’re sure you looked like a little lost puppy following him up to the bar, only to be met with a greasy mustached man.

His eyes raking over you makes your skin crawl.

“When will he be back?” you ask, planting your feet a little. You won’t let this creep ruin seeing Llewyn.

“He went to see a friend out back,” he snickers. You don’t like his tone, and you don’t know what he means by ‘friend.’ “You can go on out there if you’re so eager.”

You brush past him in the direction of ‘out back.’

It’s a dimly lit alley, and you get the feeling you should be back here. You cling to the record in your hand, you almost forgot you had it with you.

A soft pained groan tells you that you aren’t alone in this alley. You look down at your feet to see that mop of curls, Llewyn is on the ground in a heap. You gasp.

“Mr. Davis? Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” an obvious lie. He grunts and brushes off his pants as he stands. “Mr. Davis is my father,” he snorts out through his nose, he’s brushing off his jacket now. His fingers poke through holes in fingerless gloves.

“I just wanted to say, I love your music,” you blurt out.

“Thank you,” he seems to cast it aside. Then he looks up at you finally, and you can see his face in the dark alley. “Hi,” his voice is suddenly gentle and less cold; dark brows were knitted together but they relax when he sees your face.

You can see him looking you over, but it’s not like the man at the bar. You’re clinging tight to that record, his record. His expression softens even further when he sees how tight you’re holding the album. He seems shocked in fact.

He takes a step further into the light and you see his lip is split and there’s a bruise on his cheek.

“Are you alright?” you ask him again, knowing he isn’t.

His dark soulful eyes look down at his feet then back up to your face.

“Would you like to get some coffee?” he asks, his feet shuffle under him.

“I know the perfect place!” you nod and tug on his shirt sleeve.

“Llewyn,” he offers after you tell him your name, “but it seems you already know that.”

“I love this album,” suddenly you’re embarrassed now. It’s late and you’re sitting across from him in a little coffee shop. You just had hoped he’d sign it; you didn’t think this would be how your night would turn out.

“You’re the only one I think,” he seems sad taking a long drink of coffee. He sighs at the warmth.

“The Death of Queen Jane made me cry,” you laugh shaking your head. You munch on a little cookie, hoping he can’t see the tears well up in your eyes. His eyes haven’t left your face once.

“I’m glad you liked the record,” he nods, his eyes flicking away when you catch his gaze.

“Do you want to come back to my place?” you blurt out. You’re not sure why. Your question seems to catch him off guard, his eyes widen a little and he almost smiles. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that how it sounded. I own a record store, and I thought maybe you’d like to come look around?”

“Sure,” he shrugs. You feel like a fool, why would a musician want to go to a record store? Or would they? What if it discourages him?

“You don’t-“ now you’re just nervous.

He laughs, his eyes crinkle in the corners and it’s the first time you’ve really seen him smile this big. “Let’s go,” he takes another sip of coffee. “Lead the way.”

There’s a chill in the air as the two of you walk towards your apartment. You explain to him that you’ve just moved to New York after your father died. He left you the record store and the apartment attached. No one else wanted it, but you couldn’t let the music die with your father.

“I have to get my key out of my place,” you tell him, and he quietly follows behind.

“Do you want me to sign that for ya?” he motions towards the record when you set it down on the kitchen table. There’s a teasing tone to his voice, but he’s sweet.

“Yes, actually,” you laugh. “Where are those keys?” you mumble to yourself while you look for them. Llewyn wanders around your apartment looking at all your things, and for a pen. “Got it!” you exclaim. He looks up from your living room to see you still in the kitchen. “We should do something about that bruise,” you tell him and open your freezer.

“You don’t have to-“ he tries to stop you. But he doesn’t argue when you gently press ice wrapped in a rag to his cheek. “Did someone pay you?” his eyes were closed but they open to look your way. You’re still holding the ice to his cheek.

“Pay me?”

“This is just the shit I need.”

“What?” you take a step back, letting him hold the ice to his face.

“Oh fuck, I’m sorry,” he buries his face in his palm, wincing in pain when he touches his lip – and in guilt for upsetting you.

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m gonna get out of your hair,” he starts to walk past you, but you grab his arm to stop him. He seems surprised at your action, and the firmness of your hand tells him you mean it. With a sigh, he sits down on your couch and tells you his story. He doesn’t know why he’s telling you everything, and you don’t know why he decided to trust you with this information.

“So, what you’re saying is, you need somewhere to sleep tonight,” you smile at him.

“This is a nice couch,” he bounces on it a little, testing the weight.

“It doesn’t have to be the couch if you don’t want it,” you bite your lip. “You can sleep on my bed, I mean alone! Unless you want me to join-“

“The couch is fine,” Llewyn smiles again at how visibly flustered you become. Then he sees the slight disappointment in your eyes when he says no. “Someone told me it would be a favor to women everywhere if I never fucked again…” his voice trails off.

Shifting your weight, a little, you come to sit by him on the couch.

“I never do this, I mean I’ve never brought a guy home,” you look at your knee bouncing, then up to his face. He’s watching your every move. His soulful eyes under that big mop of curls are breaking your heart. “I don’t expect anything, I just meant the bed is more comfortable. I will sleep on the couch.”

“I can’t sleep in the bed, it’s yours. I’ll feel bad. Unless, you did join me,” he grins softly. He shifts in his seat, turning to face you. He reaches for you and cups your cheek in his hand. He holds your gaze for a moment, testing. Waiting to make sure you’re not going to pull away when he leans forward to capture your lips.

The gentle kiss breaks and you hop up from the couch. Now full of nervous energy. Awkwardly you both get ready for bed, unsure of the next move. Llewyn is quiet, he can sense you’re skittish. He simply undresses, leaving him only in boxer shorts and a white t-shirt.

Laying on the bed waiting for you to change, he sinks into the mattress with a sigh. He can’t even remember the last time he slept on a bed, especially one this nice.

Jittery and excited, you’ve changed from your clothes into your pajamas in the bathroom. You step into your room to find Llewyn fast asleep on your bed. A smile curves on your lips and your heart aches. From what he’s told you – you know this sweet soul hasn’t had a good night’s sleep in a long time.

So, you turn off the lights and slide under the covers with him. You curl into him like he’s a long-time lover. You smile to yourself, because in a way – he is. His music has been speaking to you for awhile now. This time you have the man the music comes from. Maybe tomorrow you will hear him sing, but right now in this moment hearing him snore softly beside you is music to your ears.

idk who to even tag??

@pascalispedro, @damndamer0n, @darksideofclarke, @tintinwrites

#llewyn davis #llewyn davis x reader #mine #my writing #im just kinda #experimenting???

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mad-prophet-of-the-airwaves · 5 years ago

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My top 10 favorite films of the decade

1. Frances Ha (2012, Noah Baumbach, USA)

I can’t imagine that this film would appear on many decade end lists, much less at the #1 spot, but this film spoke to me on a deep, personal level that few films have. I’ve never seen a film perfectly represent both the ups and down of being in your 20s. Despite dealing with some complex issues, Frances Ha is lovably lighthearted, it’s sweetly optimistic tone is incredibly infectious and every time I watch it, I’m left with a huge smile on my face. It may not be the most sophisticated film ever made, but any film that eases my mind about being an aimless twentysomething deserves to be called the best of the decade.

2. Lady Bird (2017, Greta Gerwig, USA)

Absolutely hilarious from beginning to end, but also unflinchingly honest with some pitch-perfect characters, Greta Gerwig’s solo directorial debut is an incredibly intelligent story of growing up. What really impressed me about this film is that, while it does acknowledge the difficulty of being a teenager, sometimes it can be just as hard on your parents, a theme often ignored in coming-of-age films. This really is a special film and I hope it dazzles audiences for many more years to come.

3. Joker (2019, Todd Phillips, USA)

Joker was a film that took me a while to really appreciate. After my first viewing, I enjoyed it greatly, but thought it was a little rough around the edges, but as I thought about it more, I realized how brilliant it really was and after three viewings, I feel confident ranking it among the best of the decade. It is undoubtedly the boldest reinvention of the comic book movie I’ve ever seen and one of the most transgressive Hollywood films in recent memory. It’s dark, character driven style is something I hope will influence the superhero genre for the better. Not only does this work as an origin story, but it succeeds spectacularly as a social commentary on the effects of mental illness and our broken care system. Joker can be a bit of an unpleasant viewing, due to it’s consistently dark and depressing tone, but beneath that is an incredibly intelligent character study that pays tribute to the greats and boasts a bravura Joaquin Phoenix performance.

4. Blue Valentine (2010, Derek Cianfrance, USA)

I’ll be honest with you....this film made me cry....a lot, so much so that I’m actually reluctant to ever watch it again. An absolutely heartbreaking account of how it feels to fall out of love, Blue Valentine never lets go of it’s depressing tone, even the scenes that flashback to how the lead characters fell in love have a certain melancholy feeling to them, due to the juxtaposition with scenes of their crumbling marriage. Despite how brutal this film is, it is fantastic, from beginning to end. Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams are at their best and lend realistic, devastating performances to match the tone. I’m glad to have seen this film, but don’t expect me to revisit it anytime soon.

5. Paterson (2016, Jim Jarmusch, USA)

Much like Frances Ha, Paterson is a film that moves me with it’s sweetly, optimistic tone and warm sense of humor. A simple ode to the beauty that can be found in day-to-day life, it’s a film that’ll make you pine for the simple pleasures of routine and home. It’s a very meditative film that has a very calming effect, I can watch this film in a horrible mood and still feel relaxed. Simple, but effective, Paterson is another excellent entry in Jim Jarmusch’s filmography that I look forward to seeing again and again.

6. Julieta (2016, Pedro Almodóvar, Spain)

This is a film that, while well-reviewed upon it’s release, seems to have been forgotten, even by some Almodóvar fans, which is a shame because I think it’s among his best works. Paying tribute to the female-centered melodramas of his youth, Almodóvar weaved together a touching, tantalizing anti-mystery that provides a sad, but strangely hopeful look at the struggles women face in our modern society. It’s a fascinating film with a great message that I hope audiences will gain a new appreciation for in the future.

7. Nebraska (2013, Alexander Payne, USA)

While Alexander Payne’s works usually have serious themes, masked underneath a playful, comedic tone, Nebraska is a more serious, introspective work from the filmmaker. Focusing on the on-set of old age and dying familial relationships, Nebraska is a film that’s often poignant, but not without Payne’s distinct sense of humor. What really struck me about this film is how realistic the characters are. I could compare each and every character to someone in my own life, from Bruce Dern’s senile Woody to Will Forte’s cynical David. Without a doubt, this is my favorite Alexander Payne film, due to it’s touching story, brilliant acting and it’s crisp black-and-white cinematography.

8. The Master (2012, Paul Thomas Anderson, USA)

If I had to pick one living filmmaker as a favorite, it’d be Paul Thomas Anderson. Each and every one of his films is an absolute labor of love and are technically perfect, from first frame to last. The Master is, by far, his most audacious. Every asepect of this movie works perfectly. It’s cinematography is absolutely breathtaking and captures the post-WWII setting, all of the performances are astounding, especially from the late Philip Seymour Hoffman in one of his best roles, the film’s themes of the nature of man and humans desperate need for a sense of connection are very thought-provoking and ring true. Admittedly, I had a hard time between choosing this film and PTA’s equally brilliant Phantom Thread, but the ambiguous nature and brilliant performances of The Master seems to have left the bigger impact on me.

9. Inside Llewyn Davis (2013, Coen brothers, France/USA)

While containing many of the familiar traits of the Coens’ work, Inside Llewyn Davis feels unlike any of their other works. It’s a slow, profound and melancholy film, unlike their previous eccentric comedies. I’m surprised at how well the duo can handle such a simple film. Oscar Isaac gives an excellent performance in this film as the titular Llewyn. It takes a lot of skill to take a character as unlikable as his and make him endearing. I loved the attention to detail of this film, the Coens made sure that this film was as accurate to the period as possible and it shows. At times, it felt like I was watching a documentary about 60s-era Greenwich Village. It may catch some Coen fans off guard, but it’s a fantastic entry in their filmography that you don’t want to miss.

10. We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011, Lynne Ramsay, UK)

Definitely one of the most unnerving films I’ve ever seen, We Need to Talk About Kevin is a film that has an added poignancy in recent years due to the rise of attention given to our treatment of the mentally ill. This is a film that gnaws at you by asking uncomfortable questions about mental illness, motherhood and responsibility for our actions, without ever picking sides or providing us with easy answers. Making this all the more impactful are the top-notch performances from Tilda Swinton and Ezra Miller as the troubled mother and violent son, respectively. A successful blend of horror and drama, this is a film that will unnerve even the most hardened viewers, so naturally, a second viewing isn’t guaranteed, but it’s a great film that deserves your attention, even if it’s only once.

...And that’s my list for the 2010s. Hopefully, the 2020s will be as strong a decade for film as this one was.

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doomonfilm · 4 years ago

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Ranking : The Coen Brothers (1954/1957 - present)

Directing a film can be one of the most vast, task oriented and stress inducing undertakings imaginable, which makes it odd that more directing duos, specifically sibling duos, do not exist. Sibling duos like the Wachowskis, Hughes, Farrellys, Safdies and even the Zellners have made names for themselves, but one set of siblings easily towers above the rest : the Coen brothers. With nearly 20 films under their belt, and nearly as many stylistic varieties and storytelling approaches found within, it is hard to argue the impression they have left on moviegoers worldwide over the past nearly four decades they’ve existed professionally. With such a stellar record of films under their collective belts, I’ve decided to do the most stress-inducing task of all : rank these films from least to most favorite.

18. Intolerable Cruelty (2003) For a duo with so much distinct style and flair for storytelling, this film feels the least like a Coen Brothers film.�� If anything, this feels like a script that sat on a shelf in pre-development hell, possibly for years, only for someone considering themselves a bit of a ‘maverick’ or ‘forward thinker’ to discover it and think that a dose of Coen Brothers magic could save it. Even with the star power of George Clooney and Catherine Zeta-Jones behind it, this one feels a bit too ‘by the numbers’ to stand out from an oeuvre that nears perfection.

17. Hail, Caesar! (2016) I’ll be completely honest with you all... I don’t remember much about this film. I remember enjoying it, but I don’t remember being blown away by it. I remember enjoying the colorful display of old Hollywood, and it’s always refreshing to see George Clooney lean into roles that border upon slapstick. For as much as I found this film not all that memorable, however, it stands above Intolerable Cruelty simply because it does not trigger bad memories.

16. Burn After Reading (2008) This film is what Intolerable Cruelty wanted to be... a property that is a hair closer to by the books, but full of a screwball approach that heralds to a forgotten era of film while using an incredibly stacked cast. Of all the Coen Brothers films I’ve seen, Burn After Reading feels like the property that all involved enjoyed making the most. Like many of the Coen Brothers films, the cast on this one is mega-stacked, and from top to bottom, everyone involved shines in roles that go against their standard types, or amplify the most off-beat aspects of their performing ability.

15. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018) The fact that Netflix was able to pull the Coen Brothers for a film is a win in itself, and with the duo choosing to do an anthology piece, Netflix was primed to maximize on their investment. While highly entertaining, however, the anthology nature of the property leaves it feeling a bit unfocused and disjointed at times... none of these stories really had enough meat on the bone to be expanded into feature-length films of their own, but for some reason, all parties involved passed on the opportunity to make a multi-episode serial rather than a film comprised of multiple tales. While using variance in storytelling methods and visual styles may work for some less talented directors, in the case of The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, it feels more like snack-sized bites in the place of true sustenance.

14. The Ladykillers (2004) On paper, this film should have been a disaster. The Coen Brothers generally opt for original stories, so the fact that they chose to adapt such an obscure 1950s property for the modern day was strange, especially in light of the fact that most every element with the exception of Tom Hanks’ character was given a modern update. Somehow, despite all of this oddness, The Ladykillers managed to capture a sense of the classic Coen Brothers slapstick comedy that they famously established themselves with early on in their career. Tom Hanks is given the green light to go completely ridiculous, and to much of the viewers’ delight, he does so with great aplomb. His supporting cast shines, the comedic turn brings new energy to the story, and the southern gospel setting brings a rich sense of spirituality to an otherwise run of the mill film.

13. O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) The Coen Brothers were essentially household names by the turn of the 20th century, but O Brother, Where Art Thou? propelled them into a legendary status. The grassroots mix of The Odyssey and the Robert Johnson crossroads legend took on a life of its own, leaving behind a soundtrack that birthed an entire generation of folk and bluegrass enthusiasts, as well as a film that showed the world George Clooney’s comedic chops. Much like The Ladykillers, O Brother puts viewers deep into the unfamiliar territory of Southern ‘discomfort’, with the African-American experience playing a major role in the narrative. Of all the Coen Brothers films one could use to introduce a stranger to their catalog, this one may be the best, as its infectious nature and stunning look leaves an impression on most anyone who has the pleasure to view it.

12. True Grit (2010) The Coen Brothers had already covered a wide bit of genre ground within their first three decades, but surprisingly, they’d not done a true western up to that point (though many argue that No Country For Old Men is a modern take on the western). Therefore, when it was announced that their first western would be a remake of the iconic John Wayne film True Grit, many were surprised, and curious if they could pull it off. Not only did they pull it off, but in my humble opinion, they made a version that more than holds its own against the original. For the handful of big name and seasoned actors that signed on, it was the breakthrough performance of relative newcomer Hailee Steinfeld that outshined all. While The Ballad of Buster Scruggs was a fun revisit to the world of the western, True Grit was the kind of achievement that makes me want more traditional westerns from the duo.

11. The Man Who Wasn’t There (2001) Listing the Coen Brothers films is by far the most difficult ranking I’ve done to date, and the first film that really gave me trouble in terms of placement was The Man Who Wasn’t There. Personally, I find this film to be captivating and nearly flawless... Billy Bob Thornton’s detachment is rich and intrusive, which makes it all the more sinister when he does choose to exude even a hint of passion about something, be it positive or negative. The black and white photography, in league with the tone of the film, puts me in the mindset of films like In Cold Blood, and some of the sequences in the film stand out as some of the most iconic in the world of Coen Brothers films, especially the car crash. For a classic-style film noir, a genre that anyone with half a brain knew was a slam dunk for the Coens, the duo went above and beyond to both modernize and wholly embody the style. One of several Coen Brothers films that sits with you long after the final credits have faded away.

10. Inside Llewyn Davis (2013) If this isn’t the darkest comedy in the Coen collection, it’s certainly giving the number one contender a run for its money. The intimacy of this film is unmatched within the broader collection of Coen characters, excluding The Dude, but the difference between Llewyn and The Dude is the personality equivalent of the difference between oil and water. You may marvel at Llewyn’s talent, but all the while, the film is screaming at you that “THIS IS A CHARACTER YOU SHOULD NOT ROOT FOR”. The symbolism found in the film is minimal while being incredibly effective in how it punctuates Llewyn’s personality and character, and the story structure is an equally subtle swerve that baits you into paying deeper attention, only to realize that the setup was the punchline the entire time.

9. The Hudsucker Proxy (1994) I’m a sucker for a Coen Brothers comedy, especially the ones that play like human cartoons, and one of their absolute best was The Hudsucker Proxy. The writing on this film is so tight that it would absolutely pop if it were any tighter. The entire A Christmas Carol-esque approach to the story makes it a wonderful moralistic tale that makes people laugh so much that they often don’t realize they are being taught a lesson about morals, integrity and self-respect. Tons of familiar character actors fill the frames, everyone tasked with supporting roles fit firmly and comfortably into the created world, and the man trio of Tim Robbins, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Paul Newman are functioning on genius levels of performance... especially Jennifer Jason Leigh. While not quite a holiday movie, there is enough of a holiday sense that it could be shoehorned into a seasonal viewing, but any time set aside for this gem is the right time to watch it.

8. Barton Fink (1991) In my humble opinion, this may be the strongest end to end performance from John Turturro in his long and storied career. As clear-cut fans of film, it is always a pleasure to see the Coen Brothers explore the world of film, and by using this approach, they are able to tell a bold, brash and haunting tale about the issues that come with assumptions about character and talent. The takes on Hollywood and the indifference of those in power, especially when it comes to assisting young and promising talents that may one day usurp them, and powerful. The real bow on the story, however, is the larger than life presence of John Goodman, who goes from being a slightly aggressive and overbearing sense of support to a literal madman by both name and action. For a film that mainly consists of individuals talking to one another about passion, talent and secrets, there is a kinetic energy that feeds the forward momentum of this movie, and for that, it stands out in the Coen collection.

7. Miller’s Crossing (1990) It’s not surprising that the Coen Brothers could make a compelling and memorable gangster film, but I don’t think that anyone expected a film as vicious and dark as Miller’s Crossing. For a duo that generally relies on nuance and contemplation to get their points across, this film certainly proves that they are more than capable of excelling in the direct approach as well. The era-specific costuming is outstanding, the murky city areas stand in stark contrast to the woods of the titular Miller’s Crossing, and the sheer volume of bullets are a stark reminder of the Prohibition-era story we are viewing. Gabriel Byrne shines in his lead role, bringing a world of fury, deceit and mistrust in tow with him. The iconic hat blowing in the wind serves as not only the biggest memorable moment from the film, but possibly also the single moment of peace and beauty found in a film that holds up a dirty mirror to a dark world.

6. A Serious Man (2009) Of all Coen Brothers films, this is easily the most underappreciated and slept on of the bunch. I’m a sucker for movies that embrace Murphy’s Law, and when mixed with the parable nature of the Book of Job, we are presented with a darkly comic and relatively unique version of the hero’s journey. The way that the personal, professional and philosophical problems pile up on Michael Stuhlbarg’s Larry are meant to be felt by the audience, and the way that his bad luck boomerangs out into the world during the film’s resolution must be seen in order to be believed. The way that destiny and chance dance around one another in this film is narratively breathtaking, and for such a subtle film, it is a truly remarkable achievement.

5. No Country For Old Men (2007) When you think of the Coen Brothers, you don’t necessarily think of evil incarnate, and yet, the duo succeeded in capturing a character in the form of Anton Chigurh, the closest thing to the Terminator that the duo has ever created (to my knowledge). The story is a wonderful, subtle tale of how the times can change into something we don’t recognize before we recognize the change, but it is easily Javier Bardem’s iconic performance that gives this film all of its power and ominous energy. His unyielding forward momentum, his disdain for obstacles in any form, and his disregard for human life are enough to instill real fear into those who partake in viewings, and his presence will more than likely haunt you far beyond completion of the film. A true modern-day masterpiece that would have been higher, if not for...

4. Blood Simple (1984) What a powerful debut, and one that not only hinted at, but outright put the spotlight on the promise of the Coen Brothers when it came to stark visuals and stunning storytelling. For such a simple, small scale story, the tangled web that is woven is a slippery slope of deception and distrust that leaves little to no survivors in its wake. The scale of the film is deceptively small, but the quality shines in every aspect that it can. Seeds are placed that pay off wonderfully, and the color palette presented gives the film the feeling of a Technicolor film-noir. Much like A Serious Man, Blood Simple deserves to be talked about and held up much more than it is by fans of film.

3. Raising Arizona (1987) What a wonderfully ridiculous movie about something as simple as the trials and tribulations of navigating love, marriage and parenthood. The most hilarious aspect of this film, in my opinion, is how it feels like a living and breathing cartoon, both in terms of the character performances and the outrageous events that take place within the world of the film. Nicolas Cage is operating on a completely different level, Holly Hunter is equal parts charming and hilarious, Trey Wilson is wonderfully over the top, John Goodman and William Forsythe bring excess hilarity to the wild proceedings, and Randall “Tex” Cobb is downright iconic in terms of his ridiculous character. The pacing of the film is breakneck and feverish, the comedy hits never stop coming, and the utter charm emanating from the midst of the caper presented is infectious. As a second film, this could not be any more different than Blood Simple, and yet somehow, it connected so vividly with viewers that it remains a must-watch film to this day.

2. Fargo (1996) What is there to be said about Fargo that has not already been said? For a duo with more iconic films to their name than some directors have completed films, Fargo was an immediate signal that the limits of the Coen Brothers’ creativity and skill had not even began to show its full breadth. Within less than five years of release, the film was already heralded as a classic (of all-time, not just modern day), the mystery surrounding its possibility of being based on a true story built a world of intrigue around the movie, and it has gone on to create a universe of its own in the form of an FX TV show that recently wrapped its fourth season. There is not a wasted role in this film, and to this day, any movie fan worth their salt will happily bust out their version of a Minnesota accent that is almost certainly based on one of the many memorable characters that inhabit the world of Fargo. Numerous actors, including William H. Macy, Frances McDormand and Steve Buscemi, all found breakout success in the wake of this wonderful film.

1. The Big Lebowski (1998) Was there ever any doubt for this placement? For everything that Fargo did in terms of success within the world of the film industry, The Big Lebowski did that and more for the worlds of the counter-culture and cult film fans. The story we are presented with is so simple, yet so ridiculous in its journey, that it almost insists on viewers revisiting it over and over. Like many Coen Brothers films, nobody cast in the film is wasted or misused, and due to these stellar performances, the film finds itself as one of the most quotable in recent memory. Much like the performances of the cast, the writing does not waste any words or opportunities, often referring back to itself in extremely subtle and nuanced ways that present themselves over time, and to hilarious effect. Nobody would have expected a film of this nature to have a fandom, and yet, the legions of fans for this film are unique to that of the Coen Brothers catalog in the sense of their dedication, devotion to and love of the movie. While not everyone’s cup of tea upon first viewing, The Big Lebowski is truly an example of the gift that keeps on giving.

If the Coen Brothers never make another film, they’ve already created and achieved more in their journey that most filmmakers can dream of. Many of their films could honestly be considered works of art, and nearly all of them are compelling with an ability to leave deep and lasting impressions. If you are unfamiliar with the Coen Brothers, do yourself a favor and check out their work, as it may bring a new sense of invigoration to your love of film.

Editor’s Note (12/10/2020) : Inside Llewyn Davis added to the number 10 position, all films ranked lower adjusted accordingly.

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intransigent-boy · 5 years ago

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My Top Ten Films of The Decade.

10. Her

Okay, so whether you like it or not, this movie is about the present. This movie tells a very powerful story with an embarrasingly personal narrative. You feel sorry for the main character, it makes you so uncomfortable. And the reason is, because we are all in some sense are like this guy, Theodore. We have better relationships online, and with our advices, than with real people. It’s a really bizarre conception, but we should face it, and ask ourselves: Where is the limit? The script is just brilliant, but also has very controversial scenes. Joaquin Phoenix is simply the perfect choice for a lonely man, like Theodore. Melancholy everywhere, and great visuals. Arcade Fire made the music for this, and it was pure melancholy. Very interesting film.

9. The Place Beyond The Pines

Derek Cianfrance is an exceptional director. He can wonderfully create an atmosphere with great lighting techiques, unique musics, and of course with talented actors. This movie has a linear, but quite unusual story-structure. The main theme haunts you after you watched this. Legacy!

8. Nightcrawler

Louis Bloom is something of a loner who is unemployed and ekes out a living stealing and then reselling copper wire, fencing and most anything else he can get his hands on. When late one night he comes across an accident being filmed by independent news photographer Joe Loder, he thinks he may have found something he would be good at. He acquires an inexpensive video camera and a police scanner and is soon spending his nights racing to accidents, robberies and fire scenes. He develops a working relationship with Nina Romina, news director for a local LA TV station. As the quality of his video footage improves so does his remuneration and he hires Rick, young and unemployed, to work with him. The more successful he becomes however, the more apparent it becomes that Louis will do anything - anything - to get visuals from crime scenes. The conception is just brilliant, and screams to your face, what kind of society are we living in. I think Psychopathy is going to be one of the biggest issue in our generation asides with mental illneses. And this movie reflects perfectly. You understand the character, which is geniusly performed by Jake Gyllenhaal.

7. Inside Llewyn Davis

The Coen brothers' exquisitely sad and funny new comedy is set in a world of music that somehow combines childlike innocence with an aged and exhausted acceptance of the world. It is a beguilingly studied period piece from America's early-60s Greenwich Village folk scene. Every frame looks like a classic album cover, or at the very least a great inner gatefold – these are screen images that look as if they should have lyrics and sleeve notes superimposed. This film was notably passed over for Oscar nominations. Perhaps there's something in its unfashionable melancholy that didn't hook the attention of Academy award voters. But it is as pungent and powerfully distinctive as a cup of hot black coffee. This movie is about sacrificing everything for your art, directionlessness (is there such a word?) , and finding the right path. Existential theme, with surpisingly good acting from Oscar Isaac, Adam Driver, and Justin Timberlake. This is an Odyssey-story from the 1960′s America. What more you could ask for?

6. Dunkirk

Reinventing a genre is quite exceptional. And Nolan did it. The best war movies of the last 20 years, including Saving Private Ryan and Hacksaw Ridge, have also placed viewers in the centre of battle. Nolan has not reinvented that immersive approach, but he comes close to perfecting it. The story structure is-again- brilliant. There’s no main character in the movie-just like in a war-but only scared people. They want to go home. But they can’t. We’re with them with their struggle, and fears. We’re in the air, land, or water, it’s just a haunting terror. And the soundtrack from Hans Zimmer is really remarkable. You hear it, and you recognize the movie. That’s what I call a score. Reflects perfectly, and holds the attention throughout the whole movie.

5. Hell or High Water

Another genre-twister masterpiece. This Neo-Western is just pure art. Hell or High Water is a film about a criminal who commits the ultimate offence of putting his gorgeous and much nicer brother in a ski mask for several minutes of this film. Okay actually it’s about a career criminal brother and his he-wasn’t-but-he-is-now criminal brother who team up to commit a series of small-scale bank robberies across Texas, with the aim, finally – after several generations – of lifting the family out of seemingly inescapable grinding poverty. The part of Texas they live in is dying on its feet so career criminal is pretty much the only career left open that doesn’t involve serving in a diner or herding the few remaining cattle. It would’ve been easy for Hell or High Water to to turn out a cliche-ridden double bromance as there are quite a few movie tropes in this love story / revenge thriller, so it’s a tribute to director David Mackenzie that it’s actually a very touching, at times funny, at times quite brutal story. With a bit of grudge-bearing thrown in at the end to stop it being too redemptive. Memorable scenes, great acting, and a deromanticized western-feeling. After this film, you want to live in Texas, where everything’s slower, but sometimes you can chase criminals. It’s nice, isn’t it?

4. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Martin McDonagh’s fiercely written, stabbingly pleasurable tragicomedy stars a magnificent Frances McDormand; watching it is like having your funny bone struck repeatedly, expertly and very much too hard by a karate super-black-belt capable of bringing a rhino to its knees with a single punch behind the ear. He’s a scriptwriter genius, it was shocking, how perfectly the dialouges and the actions were constructed. It is a film about vengeance, violence and the acceptance of death, combining subtlety and unsubtlety, and moreover wrongfooting you as to what and whom it is centrally about. The drama happens in a town with an insidiously pessimistic name – Ebbing, Missouri, a remote and fictional community in the southern United States, where the joy of life does seem to be receding. There is a recurrent keynote of elegiac sadness established by the Irish ballad The Last Rose of Summer and Townes Van Zandt’s country hit Buckskin Stallion Blues, a musical combination which bridges the Ireland which McDonagh has written about before and the America he conjures up here, an America which has something of the Coen Brothers. The resemblance is not simply down to McDormand, though she does give her best performance since her starring role as the pregnant Minnesota police chief in the Coens’ Fargo in 1996. It was brutal, controversial, and violent.

3. Midnight in Paris

The definitive poem in English on the subject of cultural nostalgia may be a short verse by Robert Browning called “Memorabilia.” The past seems so much more vivid, more substantial, than the present, and then it evaporates with the cold touch of reality. The good old days are so alluring because we were not around, however much we wish we were. “Midnight in Paris,” Woody Allen’s charming film, imagines what would happen if that wish came true. It is marvelously romantic, even though — or precisely because — it acknowledges the disappointment that shadows every genuine expression of romanticism. The film has the inspired silliness of some of Mr. Allen’s classic comic sketches (most obviously, “A Twenties Memory,” in which the narrator’s nose is repeatedly broken by Ernest Hemingway), spiked with the rueful fatalism that has characterized so much of his later work. Nothing here is exactly new, but why would you expect otherwise in a film so pointedly suspicious of novelty? Very little is stale, either, and Mr. Allen has gracefully evaded the trap built by his grouchy admirers and unkind critics — I’m not alone in fitting both descriptions — who complain when he repeats himself and also when he experiments. Not for the first time, but for the first time in a while, he has found a credible blend of whimsy and wisdom.

2. Beautiful Boy

This supersensitive and tasteful movie is all but insufferable, suppressing a sob at the tragedy of drug addiction afflicting someone so young and “beautiful”. It is based on what is effectively a matching set of memoirs: Beautiful Boy, by author and journalist David Sheff, his harrowing account of trying to help his son Nic battle crystal meth addiction, and Tweak – by Nic Sheff himself, about these same experiences, the author now, thankfully, eight years clean. Steve Carell does an honest, well-meaning job in the role of David and the egregiously beautiful Timothée Chalamet is earnest in the part of Nic, David’s son from his first marriage. This is like a modern-day Basketball Diaries. Honest, and Raw. Most underrated movie of the 2010′s, with an unquestionably important topic.

1. The Social Network

Before Sorkin wrote the screenplay, Ben Mezrich wrote the book based on Mark Zuckerberg and the founding of Facebook titled: The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook, A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius, and Betrayal. It was published in July 2009, and most of the information came from Facebook “co-founder” Eduardo Saverin, who in the film is played by Andrew Garfield. The screenplay that Sorkin wrote was blazing, he wrote the characters like they were in a William Shakespeare play, with a story full of lies, jealousy, and betrayal. I especially love how Sorkin balanced the story between 2003, 2004, and then 2010. It goes back and forth between the past when Facebook was just an idea for Mark, and in the current day when he is being sued by Cameron & Tyler Winklevoss for, in their minds, having stolen their original idea, and by his former best friend Eduardo for having him pushed out of the company. In fact, some of the very best dialogue (and the film is full of great quotes) happens during the deposition scenes. Well-recognizable, rapid-fire dialouges, wonderful directing, with Trent Reznor’s greatest soundtrack. The movie’s probably going to outlive the Facebook itself, and that’s just great.

#oscars #films #academyawards #2010s #best #movies #cinema #art #top ten #movies of the decade #soundtrack #cinematography

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serceleste · 5 years ago

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tagged by @rain-sleet-snow !

Author Name: celeste9

Fandoms You Write For: I’ve written for quite a few over the years but right now mostly Star Wars, and then MCU.

Where You Post: These days, just AO3, and sometimes snippets or short random stuff on Tumblr.

Most Popular One-Shot: By far it’s No More Secrets, and it continues to boggle my mind how often it still shows up in my daily kudos emails, 5 years later! It’s a Merlin/Arthur (BBC Merlin) kidnapping leads to magic reveal fic I wrote for a gift exchange after I had already begun falling out of love with the ship, and it’s one of those things where I’m absolutely thrilled people loved it so much but it’s not one of my own personal favorites, so.

Most Popular Multi-Chapter Story: In a Palace by the Lake, what I think of as the secret Prince Finn fic, lol. Not that surprising it was popular, it’s mutual pining where Finn’s a Force-sensitive prince and Poe is the idiot in love with him, ha. It was posted fall 2016, so it missed the true heyday of stormpilot frenzy but was still early enough that it was a genuine fandom juggernaut at the time.

Favorite Story You Wrote: Oh, damn, I don’t know. I judge everything I write but it’s nice to realize that there are stories I genuinely love, even if I always think they could have been improved. So I could name a number of fics here, but the first one I always think of is This Is the Road to Ruin (We Started at the End), my Finn/Poe/Rey/Kylo Ren First Order AU. It remains the longest and most ambitious thing I’ve ever written, and I’m honestly still really proud of it.

Story You Were Nervous to Post: All of them!

How Do You Choose Your Titles: I keep a list of song lyrics and poetry I can dip into, and when that fails usually something fairly generic from the fic itself.

Do You Outline: Nope, who has time for that?? I fly by the seat of my pants!! And it probably shows, lol. In seriousness, I write as stuff comes to me and then go back and fill in the blanks where needed, and I do put forethought into where I’m trying to go, but just in my head, never in a structured outlining way.

Complete: 541 fics on AO3, plus IDK how many drabbles and 3 sentence fics and other assorted tiny things I never posted there, and there’s a handful of cringey things I never bothered moving over from ffnet.

In-Progress: lol, this will take a while!

- Poe/Rey pwp

- Finn/Poe/Rey touch starvation

- time travel Poe/Rey + Kylo/Ben

- canon AU where Muran shows up alive, Finn/Poe + Poe/Muran

- canon AU Poe/Kare/Iolo where Iolo doesn’t join the Resistance with them

- SW/MCU fusion Bucky/Finn/Poe/Rey

- Poe/Luke where Poe went to Ahch-To

- dark Rey/Poe where Rey gains control of the FO and defeats the Resistance, capturing Poe in the process

- Finn/Kylo redemption fic involving hugs

- Finn/Poe undercover fake married

- Poe/Jess friends with benefits

- Finn/Poe leaning into the age difference

- Poe/Kylo where Poe goes undercover to the FO to try to turn Kylo back to the light

- sequel to the Prince Finn fic

- Poe/Leia through the events of the Poe comic up to the end of TFA

- sort of a Leia & Luke epistolary fic, letters she never sent him while he was missing

- Finn/Poe/Rey stranded on a planet with Luke

- vague possible follow up to the darkjedistormpilot First Order AU where they find the Resistance

- that Inside Llewyn Davis Llewyn/OMC fic I started once

- I have tons of little snippets of stuff that may or may not ever get turned into actual fics, Rey/Jess, Rey/Poe, Finn/Poe, Poe/Hux, Poe/Ben(Kylo), Finn/Poe/Rey, Poe/Leia, Poe/Jess...

- I have a lot of partially finished fics from old fandoms and/or fandoms I still write for but are just so old that I’ve forgotten where I was going with them, and it feels sad to admit they’re never going to be finished, especially the ones that had a lot of words!

Coming Soon/Not Yet Started:

- I still want to write the “5 times Finn wouldn’t let Poe blow something up + 1 time he did” fic

- I have a bit of something I cut from another fic I always meant to recycle into a developing relationship Rey/Jess fic

- still want to turn a snippet into a “5 times Poe and Lando had a one night stand + that time they realized five one night stands might be a relationship” fic

- always meant to write my Poe/Black One fic

- sometimes I think about the Finn/Rey figure skater/hockey player AU I wanted to write while I was in the middle of an exchange

- the dream I had where Bucky was rescuing tied-up bearded Steve wearing the stealth Cap uniform really wants to be a fic

- I never wrote the Leia/Holdo/Poe fic of my dreams

- I’m always thinking about crossovers

- ...I have a lot of ideas, okay

Do You Accept Prompts: I do, but I’ll be honest, if you prompt me at the moment I’m not going to write it, I’m lucky if I churn out a couple hundred words on the weekend and I still have likely unattainable goals of finishing some ST related WIPs before Ep IX comes out.

Upcoming Story You Are Most Excited to Write: tbh right now I’m excited whenever any words at all get produced, it’s a low bar

#meme #writing #star wars #marvel #me

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son-of-alderaan · 6 years ago

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As an undercover cop in 'BlacKkKlansman,' Adam Driver takes it personally

Promoting Spike Lee’s “BlacKkKlansman” when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May, Adam Driver gave a brief interview saying that, growing up in Indiana, “there were always Klan rallies, like, every summer.”

A few historians in Indiana pushed back, accusing Driver of indulging in hyperbole … until they checked newspaper archives and discovered that the Klan was active in the St. Joseph County area during Driver’s youth there in the ’90s.

“I heard about that peripherally,” Driver says of the debate. “That I was making it up. It was very strange. Now, I can’t keep track of every summer, but my point was that it was frequent. I didn't understand why it was questioned.”

After winning acclaim playing Lena Dunham’s aloof, intense love interest on HBO’s “Girls,” Driver has fashioned an impeccable film career, working with such giants as Martin Scorsese (“Silence”), Jim Jarmusch (“Paterson”) and the Coen brothers (“Inside Llewyn Davis”). And, yes, as Kylo Ren, he killed Han Solo in the seventh installment of the ongoing “Star Wars” franchise. (But we still prefer not to think about that.)

In “BlacKkKlansman,” Driver plays Flip, a Jewish detective who partners with a black cop (played by John David Washington) to infiltrate the Klan. We caught up with Driver recently over coffee during a brief stay in Los Angeles.

Were you surprised that people expressed skepticism about white supremacists in the Midwest?

I understand that for people in Indiana, there’s a sensitivity about not being painted with a broad brush as being a haven for racists, which it is not. But to say there is no Klan presence throughout Indiana is frustrating. I was always aware of it. In my own neighborhood, there were people down the street from me.

Flip’s complicated relationship with his own faith and heritage is one of the more interesting aspects of the film. Was that part of the appeal of playing him?

Apart from working with Spike, that’s one of the main reasons I wanted to do the film. I love the idea of your heritage becoming important to you at different times in your life. Flip doesn’t internalize his job, maybe to self-preserve. As an actor, I can understand that. But also, as an actor, I know that you have to be invested at a certain point. And when Flip goes undercover and has to say these terrible things out loud, it affects him. I don’t know how it couldn’t. So he has to face those questions. Maybe he has to take it personally and that’s not a bad thing. It’s empowering.

You strike me as an actor who takes things personally.

[Laughs] Well … yes and no. The thing about acting is that you’re always up against time, which is frustrating. You have to get it right and then move on. That’s why I try not to watch anything I’ve done because there are so many other possible ways of doing it.

You mentioned the idea of your heritage becoming important to you at different times. You were raised in the Baptist church. Do you still go?

I don’t. I think everyone is looking for something. Maybe someday, I’ll think about that more. Meanwhile, we’re all looking for some kind of explanation of why we’re here, what we are doing. I like the idea of a community hopefully creating something that explains why we do what we do, why we’re terrible to each other, why we’re great to each other. And then it’s over! [Laughs] But in the meantime, there’s coffee and conversation.

You say you try not to watch anything you’ve done. Does that apply to the “Star Wars” movies too?

“Star Wars” is a little different. There’s such a visual thing going on, especially with the first one where they were like, “Trust us. There’s space behind you. Trust us. Your lightsaber looks like this.” So I needed to see how it would come together.

What was it like watching that?

I was very numb. The first time I saw it was with Carrie Fisher and Daisy Ridley and Carrie’s dog, Gary. And you don’t know how to feel. You’ve been working on it for so long and thinking about it for so long. That’s one of the many reasons I try not to watch anything. To really absorb it, I feel like you’ve got to watch it a lot to think that it’s not you there doing it. To look at the story and not just all the mistakes you made. But I was very numb. It was a lot to take in.

Then, I saw it again at the premiere. I had never sat in the audience of a premiere of a movie I was in before. Something like that, because I knew what was coming up, the Han scene, I was very sick to my stomach, very pale, cold, waiting for it just to be over. Then, the response was so nice. It was a very memorable, crazy night.

What about “The Last Jedi”? Did you see that?

I did. I didn’t have to almost puke that time. I feel like I’m making progress.

#adam driver #blacKkKlansman #kylo ren #star wars tfa #star wars tlj #la times #interview

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uomo-accattivante · 6 years ago

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Oscar Isaac in the role of painter Paul Gauguin is trouble you see coming from a mile away—the kind you live to regret falling for anyway.

He’s a holier-than-thou painting bro with a “slightly misanthropic” streak (Isaac’s generous wording), eyes glinting with disgust in his first close-up. Pipe in one hand, book in another, dressed all black save for an elegant red scarf, he slams a table and shames the Impressionists gathered around him: “They call themselves artists but behave like bureaucrats,” he huffs after a theatrical exit. “Each of them is a little tyrant.”

From a few tables away, another painter, Vincent van Gogh, watches in awe. He runs into the street after Gauguin like a puppy dog.

Within a year, a reluctant Gauguin would move in with van Gogh in a small town in the south of France, in the hope of fostering an artists’ retreat away from stifling Paris. Eight emotionally turbulent weeks later, van Gogh would lop off his left ear with a razor, distraught that his dearest friend planned to leave him for good. He enclosed the bloody cartilage in wrapping marked “remember me,” intending to have it delivered to Gauguin by a frightened brothel madam as a bizarre mea culpa. The two never spoke again.

Or so the last two years of Vincent van Gogh’s life unspool in Julian Schnabel’s At Eternity’s Gate, itself a kind of lush, post-Impressionistic memoir of the Dutchman’s tormented time in Arles, France. (Not to mention artistically fruitful time: Van Gogh churned out 200 paintings and 100 watercolors and sketches before the ear fiasco landed him in an insane asylum.)

Isaac plays Gauguin like an irresistibly bad boyfriend, a bemused air of condescension at times wafting straight into the audience: “Why’re you being so dramatic?” he scoffs directly into the camera, inflicting a first-person sensation of van Gogh’s insult and pain.

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Yet in the painter’s artistic restlessness, Isaac, 37, sees himself: “That desire to want to do something new, to want to push the boundaries, to not just settle for the same old thing and get so caught up with the minutia of what everyone thinks is fashionable in the moment.” He talks about “staying true to your own idea of what’s great.” He talks about “finding something honest.”

From another actor, the sentiment might border on banal. But Oscar Isaac—Guatemalan-born, Juilliard-trained and, in his four years since breaking through as film’s most promising new leading man, christened superlatives from “this generation’s Al Pacino” to the “best dang actor of his generation”—might really have reason to mean what he says. He’s crawling out the other end of a life-altering two years, one that’s encompassed personal highs, like getting married and becoming a father, and an acutely painful low: losing a parent.

He basked in another Star Wars premiere, mined Hamlet for every dimension of human experience, and weathered the worst notices of his career with Life Itself. Through it all, he says, he’s spent a lot of time in his head—reevaluating who he is, what he wants, and what matters most.

Right now, he’s aiming for a year-long break from work, his first in a decade, after wrapping next December’s Star Wars: Episode IX. “I’m excited to, like Gauguin, kind of step away from the whole thing for a bit and focus on things that are a bit more real and that matter to me,” he says.

Until then, he’s just trying “to keep moving forward as positively as I can,” easing into an altered reality. “You’re just never the same,” he says quietly. “On a cellular level, you’re a completely different person.”

When we talk, Isaac is in New York for one day to promote and attend the New York Film Festival premiere of At Eternity’s Gate. Then it’s back on a plane to London, where Pinewood Studios and Star Wars await.

Episode IX, the last of Disney’s new Skywalker trilogy, will see Isaac reprise the role of dashing Resistance pilot Poe Dameron, whose close relationship with Carrie Fisher’s General Leia evokes joy but also melancholy after Fisher’s untimely passing.

Each film was planned in part as a celebration and send-off to each of the original trilogy’s most beloved heroes: in The Force Awakens, Han Solo (Harrison Ford); in The Last Jedi, Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill); Fisher, meanwhile, had hoped to save Leia’s spotlight for last but passed unexpectedly long before filming began. Director J.J. Abrams, returning to close the trilogy he opened with Episode VII, has since said that unseen footage of Fisher from that previous film will ensure the General appears, however briefly.

For his part, Isaac promises the still-untitled ninth film will pay appropriate homage to Leia—and to Fisher’s sense of fun. “The story deals with that quite a bit,” he says. “It’s a strange thing to be on the set and to be speaking of Leia and having Carrie not be around. There’s definitely some pain in that.” Still, he says, compared to the first two installments, “there’s a looseness and an energy to the way that we’re shooting this that feels very different.”

“It’s been really fun being back with J.J., with all of us working in a really close way. I just feel like there’s an element of almost senioritis, you know?” he laughs. “Since everything just feels way looser and people aren’t taking it quite as seriously, but still just having a lot of fun. I think that that energy is gonna translate to a really great movie.”

Fisher’s absence is felt keenly on set, Isaac says. As if to reassure us both, however, he reiterates: “It deals with the amazing character that Carrie created in a really beautiful way.”

Two months after Fisher’s death, Isaac’s mother, Eugenia, passed away after an illness. A month after that, the actor married his girlfriend, the Danish documentarian Elvira Lind. Another month later, the couple welcomed their first son, named Eugene to honor the little boy’s grandmother. Work offered a way for a reeling Isaac to process.

There was his earth-shaking run at Hamlet, in which Isaac starred as the titular prince in mourning at New York’s Public Theater. And then there was writer-director Dan Fogelman’s Life Itself, a film met with reviews that near-unanimously recoiled from its “cheesy,” “overwrought” structure, filled with what one critic called the genuine emotion of “a damage-control ExxonMobil commercial.”

The reaction surprised Isaac. “I thought it was some of my strongest work,” he says. “Especially at that moment in my life. This guy is dealing with grief and, for me, it was a really honest way of trying to understand those emotions and to create a character who was also going through just incomprehensible grief.” He’s proud of the performance—and, in a strange way, heartened by the sour critical response.

“To be honest,” he says brightly, “there was something really comforting about it.” That the work “for me, meant something and for others, didn’t at all, it just made the whole thing not matter so much in a great way.”

“I was able to explore something and come out the other end and feel like I grew as an actor,” he explains. “That matters to me a lot. And the response to that, you know, it’s interesting of course, but it was a great example for me of how it really doesn’t dictate how I then feel about what I did.”

He thinks for a moment of performances and projects that, conversely, embarrassed him—ones that to his shock, boasted “really great notices” in the end. “You just never know, you know? It’s completely out of my control.”

Isaac is an encouraging listener in conversation, doling out interested yeahs and uh-huhs, and often warm, self-deprecating laughter. When I broach a particularly personal subject, he seems to sit up—somehow, suddenly more present. It’s about his last name.

Óscar Isaac Hernández Estrada dropped both surnames before enrolling at Juilliard in 2001. He’d run into several Óscar Hernándezes at auditions by that point, and taken note of the stereotypes casting directors seemed to have in mind for them—gangsters, drug dealers, the works. So he made a change, not unlike many actors do.

Whether Óscar Hernández might have had a crack at the astonishingly diverse roles Oscar Isaac has inhabited, we’ll never know. But given Hollywood’s limiting tendencies, it’s less likely he might have played an English king for Ridley Scott in 2010’s Robin Hood, three years before his breakthrough role as a cantankerous folk singer in Joel and Ethan Coen’s Inside Llewyn Davis. He was an Armenian genocide survivor in last year’s The Promise, an Israeli secret agent in August’s Operation Finale, and now, he’s the Frenchman Paul Gauguin.

Star Wars’ Poe Dameron, meanwhile, or the mysterious tech billionaire in Alex Garland’s Ex Machina, or the army commando in his second Garland mind-twist, Annihilation, specify no ethnicities at all. It’s the dream: to be hailed as a great actor, period, and not a “great Latino actor” first. To be appreciated for your talent, and seen as “other” rarely at all.

There’s a crawl space between those distinctions, though, where another anxiety lives. The one that makes you wonder: Am I “representing” as loudly as I should? Am I obligated to do so in my work? If I don’t, what does that make me? Questions for when you grew up in Miami, or another Latino-dominant place, reckoning with how you’re perceived in a spotlight outside of it. Isaac listens attentively. Then for several unbroken minutes, talks it out with himself.

He rewinds to yesterday, when he boarded a plane from London on which an air steward addressed him repeatedly as “señor,” unbidden. “It was just a little weird. So I started calling him ‘señor’ as well. I was like, thank you, señor!” Isaac recalls, cracking up. “But then at the same time, I had that thought. I was like, but no, I should really, you know, be proud of being a señor, I guess?”

“I think for a lot of immigrants, the idea is that you don’t always just want to be thought of as other. Like, I don’t want him to be just calling me ‘señor.’ Why?” he asks, more of the steward than himself. “Because I look like I do, so I’m not a mystery anymore? It did bring up all those kinds of questions.”

He grew up in the United States, he explains; his family came over from Guatemala City when Isaac was 5 months old. “I’m most definitely Latino. That’s who I am. But at the same time, for an actor it’s like, I want to be hired not because of what I can represent, but because of what I can create, how I can transform, and the power of what I create.”

Still, Isaac has eyes and ears and exists in the year 2018 with the rest of us. “I’m not an idiot,” he adds. “And I know that we live in a politically charged time. There’s so much terrible language, particularly right now, being used against Latinos as a kind of political weapon.” He recognizes, too, the necessity “for people to see people that look like them, because that’s a very inspiring thing.”

As a kid, Isaac looked up to Raúl Juliá, the Puerto Rican-born actor and Broadway star whose breakthrough movie role came as Gomez Addams of the ’90s Addams Family films. “But I looked up to him particularly because he was a Latino that wasn’t being pigeonholed just in Latino parts,” Isaac adds.

“I do think there is a separation between the artist and the art form, between a craftsperson and the craft,” he says, applying the difference in this context to himself. He calls it “that double thing,” as apt a term as any for that peculiar, precise tension: “Like yes, I am who I am, I came from where I come from. But my interest isn’t just in showing people stuff about myself, because I don’t find me to be all that interesting.”

“What is more interesting to me is the work that I’m able to do, and all that time that I spent learning how to do Shakespeare and how to break down plays and try to create a character and do accents,” he says. “That, for me, is what’s fun.”

But it’s always that “double thing”—reconciling two pulls and finding a way not to get torn up. He wants American Latinos “to know, to be proud that there is someone from there that is out and doing work and being recognized not just for being a Latino that’s been able to do that.” On the other hand, he’s “just like any artist who’s out there doing something. I feel like that’s…” He pauses. “That’s also something to be proud of, you know?”

Isaac’s focus lands on me again. “And I think for you too, you’re a writer and that’s what you do. Your identity is also part of that, but I think that you want the work to stand on its own, too.” His sister is “an incredible scientist. She’s at the forefront of climate change and particularly how it affects Latino communities and low-income areas. And she is a Latina scientist, but she’s a scientist, you know? She’s a great scientist without the qualifier of where she’s from. And that’s also very important.”

Paul Gauguin’s life after van Gogh’s death by gunshot at 37 revealed more repugnant depths than his dick-ish insensitivity.

He defected from Paris again, this time to the South Pacific, determined to break from the staid art scene once and for all. He “married” three adolescent brides, two of them 14 years old and the other 13, infecting each girl with syphilis and settling into a private compound he dubbed Maison de Jouir, or “House of Orgasms.” “Pretty gnarly, nasty stuff,” Isaac concedes, though he withholds judgment of the man in his performance onscreen.

To do so might have made his Gauguin—alluring, haughty, insufferable, brilliant—“not quite as complex.” Opposite Willem Dafoe’s divinely wounded depiction of van Gogh, however, he found room to play. “It was interesting to ask, well, what’s the kind of person that would feel that he’s entitled to do those kinds of things?” The man onscreen is an asshole, to be sure, but hardly paints the word “sociopath” onto a canvas. He’s simply human: “I think that anyone has at least the capacity to do” what Gauguin did, Isaac reasons.

The actor has had more than one reason to think on a person’s capacity to do terrible things in the last year. Two men he’s worked with—his Show Me a Hero director, Paul Haggis, and X-Men: Apocalypse helmer Bryan Singer—were both accused of sexual assault in the last year, part of a torrent of unmasked misconduct Hollywood’s Me Too movement brought to national attention.

“It’s a tricky thing,” Isaac says, “because you get offered jobs all the time and, I guess, what’s required now? What kind of background checks can someone do beforehand? There isn’t a ton.” (Just ask Olivia Munn.) “Especially as an actor, to make sure that the people you’re working with, surrounding yourself with, haven’t done something in their past that I guess will make you seem somehow like you’re propping up bad behavior.”

Carefully, he expresses reservations about the phenomenon of the last year. “People don’t feel like they’re getting justice through any kind of legal system, so they take it to the streets,” he ventures. “It’s basically street justice. You have no other option. And what happens when you take it to the streets is that damage occurs, and sometimes people get taken down, things get destroyed that you feel like maybe shouldn’t have.”

“But some of it had to happen, and hopefully now there’ll be more of a system in place to take these things seriously,” he says. “It seems like it is starting to happen more, but then you see things like, how can this person get away with it? How can that person? It just boggles the mind.”

He pulls back again, remembering what’s out of his control.

Tomorrow, he’ll be back in an X-Wing suit, as Poe struggles to accept the same truth. In a year, he’ll be home in New York with his wife and young son, focusing on matters more “real” than Hollywood, its artists, and its art. Whatever he chooses whenever he returns, he’ll be ready—for the critics, the questions, for this new reality.

“All I can do is just do what means something to me,” he says. “You just have to find something honest.” One expects he will.

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#oscar isaac #paul gauguin #at eternity's gate #poe dameron #star wars #carrie fisher #episode ix #episode 9 #operation finale #life itself #inside llewyn davis #hamlet #robin hood #the promise #ex machina #annihilation #show me a hero #x men: apocalypse #interview

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