O Brother, Where Art Thou? - From Greek Classic to American Original In the winter of 2001, American audiences initially paid little attention to Joel and Ethan Coen's Depression era, jail-break, musical "buddy" comedy O Brother, Where Art Thou? The film's reputation lingered, however, and over the next seven months O Brother eventually grossed a significant $45.5 million (imdb.com). Loosely adapted from Homer’s The Odyssey, the film focuses on Ulysses Everett McGill’s (George Clooney’s) journey
The Coen Brothers’ “Oh Brother Where Art Thou?”, loosely based on Homer’s classic adventure The Odyssey, is a film amusingly filled with themes of symbolism similar to those found in Homer’s epic, while still maintaining a sense of originality and style that they have become so renowned for. An exciting and entertaining blend of high adventure, humour, and heartfelt emotion, at first glance, the film barely resembles Homer’s poem: only certain elements are obvious, such as the main character’s name
The Odyssey in Oh Brother, Where Art Thou The movie O Brother, Where Art Thou is a wonderful movie that was directed by the Coen brothers. The movie features a cast of talented actors, the movie has also won several awards. The book The Odyssey is a timeless classic and it was written by the mysterious bard Homer. The book tells the tale of our hero Odysseus as he attempts to make it home to his wife. There are many ways to relate the movie plot and characters, to Odysseus's journey in The
I have seen O Brother, Where Art Though? a few times since it was released. I have always found it humorous and enjoyed the movie. Watching it after reading the Odyssey brought new meaning to the film for me. I found the movie to be much smarter than I previously recognized. The parallel story structure with the Odyssey had me waiting for the next metaphor. From the prophecy, the journey, the trials and adventures along the way to the reunion the movie and book followed a mans return to his home
This week as we watch O Brother, Where Art Thou? and The Piano, we are given two parameters to compare and contrast the two. The techniques employed by the director and the musical score show how these movies took different paths to keep the viewer engaged at each step of the process. Even though the films tackle vastly different topics, the ability of both "period pieces" (Petrie-Boggs 89) to tackle important issues bring them together wonderfully. Although one film sticks to it's heart and
film O Brother, Where Art Thou? is a reinterpretation of the epic poem The Odyssey. The Coen brothers, writers and directors of the film, did not over analyze their representation. “It just sort of occurred to us after we’d gotten into it somewhat that it was a story about someone going home, and sort of episodic in nature, and it kind of evolved into that,” says Joel Coen in Blood Siblings, “It’s very loosely and very sort of unseriously based on The Odyssey” (Woods 32). O Brother, Where Art Thou
12, 2008 Film Analysis “O Brother Where Art Thou” This old time musical theatrical movie clip was an insightful blast from the past that made you cherish those days where it was inconceivable to not be a gentlemen, and it was a down right shame to be anything less then an honest women. This old time movie with a new age attitude definitely strikes the funny bone of any modern day movie watcher. “The opening titles inform us that the Coen Brothers' "O Brother, Where Art Thou" is based on Homer's The
Odyssey”. However, there is one movie that stands out as unique and its title is “O Brother Where Art Thou”. The producers, Joel and Ethan Coen, did a wonderful job in making actor Ulysses Everett McGill represent Odysseus. Everett from “O Brother Where Art Thou” and Odysseus from Homer’s “The Odyssey” are very similar in many ways, but contrast in multiple qualities and characteristics as well. In “O Brother Where Art Thou”, the main character, Everett is on a voyage trying to
synergism of myth and ritual as expressed in a variety of forms (Bittarello) In many stories, there are several archetypes of behavior. It is quite interesting to note that certain themes are repetitive they appear again and again over time in literature, art, music, religion and culture irrespective of the time period of the geographical There are numerous examples of these archetypes in recent mythologically based stories. We have the Jedi Knights in Star Wars; the treasure varies from movie to
intellectual nature, Prometheus is the archetype of the Romantic Rebel. This rebellious figure would not reconcile with his oppressor of mankind. Demogorgon represented the great force needed to effect perfection. He was given birth to after Zeus/Jupiter’s union with Thetis