3.5 stars (out of 5)
Recent efforts by those co-writing, co-directing, co-producing and pseudonymously-co-editing Coen brothers, Joel and Ethan, have been uneasily eccentric (A Serious Man, the True Grit remake, Inside Llewyn Davis), but their latest’s Hollywood setting seems to suggest a return to form that might hark back to their unsettling classic Barton Fink. However, nothing’s ever quite as easy as that in the Coens’ movies, and this spectacularly-cast, authentic-looking effort feels all a bit screwy, and while there are delightful moments, it’s never quite the knockabout slapstick comedy the trailer suggests, and should leave you royally puzzled.
In 1951 we meet Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin in his third Coens picture), head of production and chief ‘fixer’ at Capitol Pictures (the same studio from Barton Fink, amusingly enough), and the narrator (English actor Michael Gambon) leads us through his chaotic schedule. Mannix, a family man (married to Alison Pill from The Newsroom in a cameo) and Catholic, works hard to keep the scandalous activities of the studio’s stars out of the press back when celebrity outrageousness was a bad thing, and he’s particularly concerned that sleazy secrets don’t find their way into the articles of bitchy twin columnists Thora and Thessaly Thacker (both played by Tilda Swinton).
Capitol have begun shooting a prestige production titled Hail, Caesar!, an epic with a plot that sounds, oddly enough, a little like the in-cinemas-now Risen and a major star named Baird Whitlock (George Clooney in his fourth Coens picture), who’s somewhat reminiscent of Charlton Heston and Kirk Douglas but dumber than both. When Whitlock is kidnapped by ‘The Future’, a curious bunch of tweedy sorts, Mannix is on the case, and the plot then ropes in: dim Western thespian Hobie Doyle (Alden Ehrenreich), who’s trying to go upmarket with a filming of a genteel Broadway play being directed by fancy Laurence Laurentz (Ralph Fiennes); a brassy synchronised-swimming-movie star named DeeAnna Moran (Scarlett Johansson looking scared in some shots); and a big name in musicals, Burt Gurney (Channing Tatum), who we watch hoofing his way through a wonderfully homoerotic dance number.
If that sounds slightly jumbled then that’s because it is, and the Coens’ plot starts to feel like a series of sometimes wildly elaborate vignettes in which their heavyweight pals enjoy one or two scenes, and while some of them are fabulous (and Clooney upstages them all in a fine comic performance), the overall effect is a bit head-scratching. And prepare yourself for an abrupt ending that’s less “Hail!” and more “Huh???”.
I Wake Up Screening 