O Brother, Where art Thou? is the first in a line of films that seem to be the undoing of the once-great Coen brothers. It is difficult to imagine that the same people that made this and The Ladykillers, also made brilliant films like Blood Simple, Miller's Crossing, and Fargo. The Coen brothers were one of the big reasons that I began studying film in the first place, and I still hold them in high regard, but O Brother, Where Art Thou? is among their weakest works. Despite this fact, it had a huge fan following and a high box office, not to mention a soundtrack that took home the Grammy for best album.

The fault lies mainly with its story. The Coen brothers claim in their opening credits that O Brother is based on Homer's “Odyssey,” but later admit to never actually having read Homer's work. This explains the episodic structure of this picture, and some of the key plot points, but perhaps had they done a genuine adaptation with plenty of liberties taken, O Brother's structure would have been a little more enjoyable. As it stands, the movie has a distinctly disjointed feel to it that keeps the audience from really getting involved. I normally wouldn't mind a certain distance, but I generally find the Coen's work to be very easy to get lost in, and that's one of the reasons I like them so much. On top of that, a musical (of sorts) that keeps its audience at a distance must be contrary to intention. I sense a frustration between what is being attempted, and what is being accomplished. Even a lot of the humor seems washed out, and falls flat.

O Brother is still not bad film. Not even in the slightest. Cinematographer Roger Deakins creates a beautiful unique look to this picture, reminiscent of flipping through history books on the time era that O Brother takes place in. It's inspiring work.

It is also George Clooney's first role as a goofy slapstick actor, and had I not seen him myself, I would not have believed that he would be this good. This, and a later Coen effort, Intolerable Cruelty, establish Clooney as one of the premier comic actors of contemporary cinema. He is brilliant.

And lastly, even though it is disjointed, there are individual scenes of comic brilliance; both in wordplay and in slapstick. The characters are infinitely charming, and when the script works with them, it works incredibly well. The music is interwoven seamlessly into the film, and never seems like a gimmick, which is a difficult thing to execute, especially considering that the Coens have never worked on a musical before this.

Perhaps had I not been familiar with the Coen pictures that preceded O Brother, I would not have been as disappointed with it as I ended up being. Seeing a wholly imperfect Coen picture was something I hadn't experienced before, and had never expected to ever have to.