Rank the Coen Brothers films (that you have seen)

Christ, man, don’t make me call an ambulance on ya

It’s okay, I’ve got one on hot standby in the tubes and ready for launch as soon as I get home.

That was harder than I thought.

  1. Miller’s Crossing
  2. Barton Fink
  3. Blood Simple
  4. No Country For Old Men
  5. O Brother, Where Art Thou?
  6. Big Lebowski
  7. Fargo
  8. Raising Arizona
  9. Husucker Proxy
  10. Hail Caesar

Everything else qualifies in my mind as “minor Coens”. I still haven’t seen Ballad of Buster Scruggs so I can’t rate it, but mostly I hear positive things about it.

I wouldn’t call it a bummer. There’s a lot of backstabbing all throughout the movie and maybe some guys get their just deserts, but there are a couple of survivors at the end of the movie. I wouldn’t say it’s a sunny, happy ending, either.

I do love me some Coens. Let’s see here…

The Big Lebowski
Fargo
Barton Fink
No Country For Old Men
Miller’s Crossing
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Raising Arizona
Inside Llewyn Davis
Burn After Reading
Hail, Caesar!
The Hudsucker Proxy
Blood Simple
A Serious Man
The Ladykillers
True Grit

That was tougher than I’d thought it’d be, and I realize that list would make up a good portion of my top-100 list.

My list…and thread. 😀

Bah sorry

No criticism. More Coen talk is good.

These are my four fav Coen movies. Infinitely re-watchable. If I had to pick a #1, I’d go with Fargo. Great film start to finish.

It’s the smart play.

If you think Goodfellas or The Godfather was a bummer, then it’s a bummer. It’s basically the Coen Bros take on mob movies. It’s not as bleak as No Country for Old Men, but not as light-hearted as The Big Lebowski.

And more specifically, if “The Man Who Wasn’t There” was their take on crime dramas based on James M. Cain novels like “The Postman Always Rings Twice” and if “The Big Lebowski” was a loopy, stoned, early '90s take on West Coast detective movies based on Raymond Chandler novels like “The Big Sleep”, then “Miller’s Crossing” was their take on crime novels by Dashiell Hammett, especially “The Glass Key” and “Red Harvest”.

His kind of protagonist often featured a flawed, clever, tough guy, who might not be clever or tough enough to overcome overwhelming odds, really twisty plots, or stilleto-sharp dialogue. And that’s just what the Coens produced in Gabriel Byrne’s Tom.

Tessio was always smarter.

You know I have it in my second Tier (the Tiers are because any of those films can float around in those categories, my numerical ratings could change daily). But the one I keep coming back to, and that is just intriguing, even though I have it in my second tier, is Barton Fink. On some days. Some days, mind you, it bumps Lebowski and and my top tier is No Country, Fink and Miller’s Crossing, in no particular order.

  1. No Country For Old Men
  2. Fargo
  3. Raising Arizona
  4. O Brother, Where Art Thou?
  5. Burn After Reading
  6. Barton Fink

The ones I haven’t seen yet.

  1. The Big Lebowski

I don’t think in the same top ten lists as I guess most people do, or I guess most people around here do. Things don’t stack that neatly in my brain. So I’ll tell you how I think about the Coen Brothers movies. I guess I have tiers, kind of like @navaronegun, or at least this probably explains my feelings as well as anything else.

At the top, there are three Coen Brothers movies I can watch anytime, anywhere:

The Big Lebowski
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Barton Fink

Then there are the movies that I think are really good, but I don’t feel the need to see them again:

Raising Arizona
Miller’s Crossing
True Grit
The Hudsucker Proxy
No Country for Old Men

And then there are the Coen Brothers movies that I don’t have a strong feeling one way or another about:

Fargo
Intolerable Cruelty
Blood Simple

And so far, only one Coen Brothers movie that I can say I just didn’t care for at all:

The Man Who Wasn’t There

The rest I haven’t seen. So, there you go.

Burn After Reading should we way higher on these lists IMO.

“This. Is. A crucifixion!”

  1. Fargo
  2. The Big Lebowski
  3. No Country For Old Men
  4. Oh Brother Where Art Thou?
  5. Raising Arizona
  6. Inside Llewyn Davis
  7. Burn after Reading
  8. A Serious Man
  9. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
  10. The Hudsucker Proxy
  11. Barton Fink
  12. True Grit
  13. Hail, Caesar!

I will say the only correct answer for #1 is Fargo, as it is basically a perfect movie, a comic tragedy that might be my favorite movie of all time. Almost as quotable as Lebowski, with Frances McDormand putting in one of the greatest performances in a film.

But, the fact that there isn’t much agreement here, other than that we all agree at how great these filmmakers are, proves just how excellent and comprehensive their filmography is. There is something for everyone, and we all have our own tastes.

We should do a Spielberg thread.

Fargo, The Big Lebowski, and No Country For Old Men are three of the most memorable films I have ever seen, but I have no idea how to rate them against each other, they are just such different animals.

Barton Fink and Burn after Reading were also top notch movies.

Not especially a fan of Oh Brother Where Art Thou? or The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (my wife liked it though) or A Serious Man.

I’m not gonna rank them all, just note that Hail, Caesar! is apparently much higher on my list than most, and Lebowski much closer to the bottom. Unpopular opinions etc etc