A Serious Man - A Seriously Good Film
The invented mythos and synchronicity of the retro flat canvas of "A Serious Man" by Joel and Ethan Coen - is both a story that drives home the possibility that one testament, might indeed - be enough and also that cause and effect always connect. Apart from being a really funny film.
The subtext of the film is life as a form of probability. What is the chance, that a man will develop cancer? Or that a Tornado will strike where you stand? That you will be in a car crash at exactly the same time as the guy who's fucking your wife?
The climax of the film is a stoned bar mitzvah scene, which is great if you like to be stoned and look at neat colors through stained glass - but it is a red herring. The real center of the film rests in the first moment - the film is in fact, a modern legend - a new telling of a tale that will be added to the great collection of stories that guide us. The center of this film is a cat, a rabbi - and a south korean.
A horse, a guy, and a rabbi walk into a bar - and the rabbi turns around and says.. "What is this, a Joke?"
A man dies - but is he dead? And he appears at someones door, alive - or ... is he alive? And then, instead of the thanks one would get for doing a Mitzvah - one gets an icepick to the chest. And for a few moments we believe the shaft of it - piercing his sternum - is indeed simple held in space by ecto - and then the telltale bloodstain circles the icepick and the man gets up - saying he knows when he is not wanted - and he walks out into the dark eastern european night.
If we receive all things with simplicity - he is neither alive nor dead - an icepick into the heart, will kill you. And though you are walking through the snow you will collapse. Life can be half lived and someone can be half dead.
And you can be half a man - half a citizen of israel -and half a boy. You can walk up to the Torah - read the lines as if you really understood them - you can take the place of being a cantor- and call out waves of sound through a synagogue with as much spirit of their intent as the once recording of a film replayed gives you the heart and soul of what had occurred. And we can copy music endlessly - without paying for it - fully expecting a music industry to remain alive, vibrant - we can google our research papers and if there isn't a story in our tradition - we can invent one.
The possibility that multiple worlds - multiple universes coexist in this spacetime continuum - that we can be here - and at the same time - there - should have practical application. The Rabbi - as he stands over the coffin of the man who would have been fucking the wife of the main character - asks - where does a man go, after he dies?
And more importantly. What happens to a man - if you die laughing while you're watching a film? These questions are good to keep in mind if you plan on watching "A Serious Man". But remember.
I think its a drive in us to care about the people in our lives - the main character and his brother are close. But the brother is by and large living in a world of ghosts. He can't seem to get himself turned around. And in the end - a dream sequence in which he attempts to cross over a border gives a definition to the entropy that begins to eat at us - there is a constant smile on our face - we watch this film following the pirouette of a persons life apparent disintegrating before our eyes - and yet the very questions that keep him alive seem to be embodied in the very worst action he takes in his dream. He gives his brother something he shouldn't have taken - and sends him somewhere he shouldn't be. And his neighbor sends him straight to hell.
This film would have been much easier to enjoy - had I watched it with someone. And finally, in the end - I did. Even though - I didn't. And I finished the movie. The question of whether or not the film, is finished with me. Is an open one.
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