Joel & Ethan Coen
Fratello, dove sei?

O Muse!
Sing in me and through me the story tell
Of that man skilled in all ways of contending...
A traveler, tormented for years and years...

For once, these verses are not only tied to the memory of some tedious Greek translation from high school, but thanks to the Coens, they remind us of one of their most entertaining and free-spirited films. O Brother, Where Art Thou?, released in 2000, two years after the grand success of The Big Lebowski, transports us to rural Mississippi towards the end of the 1930s, in the midst of the Great Depression. Ulysses Everett McGill (a histrionic George Clooney), Pete Hogwallop (John Turturro), and Delmar O'Donnell (Tim Blake Nelson) are three convicts escaped from a chain gang; along the road that should lead them to a hidden treasure, they will encounter other characters inspired by Homer's tale but who also embody Southern stereotypes, like the tenacious Sheriff Cooley/Poseidon, the three laundresses/sirens, a one-eyed Bible salesman/Polyphemus (John Goodman), a blind old black man who predicts the future/Tiresias and the blind manager of a radio station who makes them folk music stars/Homer, but also not directly related to the myth like Tommy, a young bluesman who sold his soul to the devil. However, more than the treasure, Everett is interested in returning as soon as possible to his wife Penny/Penelope (Holly Hunter), a woman far less patient than her mythological equivalent, before she remarries.
As highlighted, the excellent cast brings together "usual suspects" like John Goodman, John Turturro (the last film of the duo in which he appears), Holly Hunter, and Charles Durning with actors who we will often see from now on, like George Clooney, Michael Badalucco, and Stephen Root.

More than the Homeric references (as also emphasized by the Coens themselves, who have admitted to never having read the Homeric poem), other important themes of the film include a more bitter description than it seems of the Depression era in the Southern states still populated with prejudices and quacks among opportunistic politicians with their election campaigns fought by any means, and the Ku Klux Klan (the choreography that accompanies their ritual is masterful). The film's title is a reference to Preston Sturges' Sullivan's Travels, in which the protagonist wanted to make a film about the poverty and despair of that era called O Brother, Where Art Thou?. And it's precisely on this basis that the Coens' gaze focuses on the marginalized, among convicts, swindlers, and racists. Parodying Homer's Ulysses, a hero of great abilities, even the good-for-nothing Ulysses Everett McGill can be the protagonist of extraordinarily ordinary events.
Highlighting what already occurred with the previous film, music becomes the true protagonist of the scene, to the point of seeming like a musical at times: many scenes are accompanied by an exhilarating selection (that mixes songs of the era with modern compositions) of gospel and soul with great spiritual power, but also work songs, funeral chants, and more canonical compositions of blues/country/bluegrass, like "You Are My Sunshine" or "Man of Constant Sorrow", so much so that the film's soundtrack, curated by T-Bone Burnett, won 3 Grammy Awards.

The splendid cinematography (which gives a vintage sepia effect to the entire film), the fast pace and always captivating gimmicks, united with a citationism this time unrestrained and almost "Quentin Tarantino-esque" (ranging from Moby Dick to The Wizard of Oz) are an added value of this fun comedy, with the Coens more creative than usual but perhaps less incisive, with the flaw of a somewhat too light and carefree plot that remains enjoyable; the film suffers, like The Hudsucker Proxy, from the grandeur of the previous and subsequent films, to the point of seeming a (albeit small) step back.

RATING = 7.5