ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, March 23, 1996 TAG: 9603260026
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 10 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: MOVIE REVIEW
SOURCE: KATHERINE REED STAFF WRITER
You could say that the Coen brothers have gone back to basics with their latest killer comedy, "Fargo."
But you would have to have seen everything they've ever done - from their illustrious beginning with "Blood Simple" to the much less satisfying "Hudsucker Proxy" - to experience the full circle of their artistic achievement.
And it isn't necessary to have seen any of their movies at all to love "Fargo," about a dim-witted (we're talking 20 watts, here) Minnesota car salesman who manages to make a genuine bloody mess of a bunch of lives when he hatches a plot to have his wife kidnapped.
Jerry Lundegaard's objective is to keep a whole bunch of the ransom money that his rich father-in-law will cough up to satisfy the kidnappers' demand. Poor Jerry (William H. Macy) has gotten himself in a whole bunch of trouble - probably through fraudulent car loans - and needs the money fast.
So he hires creepy Carl (Steve Buscemi, the unwashable) and the androidish Gaear Grimsrud (Peter Stormare) to kidnap Jean (Kristin Rudrud).
The movie is based on a true story. And in real life, it isn't always easy to commit a crime. So things go wrong, as they must when the Coen brothers do murder. Someone must always end up alongside the wide-open road, lugging a bloody body. Or disposing of body parts in an upsetting way (wood-chipper sales will not be enhanced by this film).
Into the mess waddles pregnant Brainerd, Minn., police chief Marge Gunderson, played by the fabulous Frances McDormand. Marge is a veritable walking textbook of police procedure, an idiot savant of criminology. When she spies a wound in the hand of one of the victims, she says, "Well, that would be a defensive wound, yah?"
``Yah,'' agrees her not-so-gifted patrolman Lou (Bruce Bohne).
And when a suspect flees in the middle of a Marge interview, the police chief says something like, ``Oh- oh- fleeing interview! Fleeing interview!" and gets on the horn "in a jif" - because she's Marge.
There's no question the Coen brothers have always had a thing or two to say about how real people get themselves into trouble in real life - even in the cartoonish classic, "Raising Arizona." And in "Fargo," Marge is the simple - not stupid - light shining in the dimness of the bad guys' moral darkness.
The purity of the cold, snow-shrouded Minnesota plain underscores the message, visually. Even Jerry's car parked all alone - except for the neatly trimmed trees - seems to contain a warning to him as he leaves a disappointing meeting with his tyrannical father-in-law: Keep it simple, stupid.
Folks from way up north might not love the smorgasbord jokes, or the not-so-gentle fun the Coens poke at accents in the Great White North. But in a way, "Fargo" is a loving portrait of a singular place. It's also very funny - unless you're from Minnesota and lack a sense of humor to start with.
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Fargo
****
A Gramercy Pictures release showing at The Grandin Theatre. Rated R for explicitly sexual situations, violence and profanity. 100 minutes.
LENGTH: Medium: 64 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Frances McDormand plays Marge Gunderson, the policeby CNBchief of Brainerd, Minn., in "Fargo." color.