Blood Simple
I just watched this movie for the second time. It had been a long while since the first time. And this time I watched the Director's Cut.
This may be the first time ever that a "Director's Cut" is actually shorter than the original release. Anyways the whole idea is absurd since the Coen brothers have always had final cut on all of their films from what I know. And CERTAINLY with this movie which was their first movie and pretty much an entirely independent endeavor.
This is not the only unusual thing about the DVD release of this film, but the commentary track is probably the most entertaining I have ever heard. It's a total parody of these pseudo-intellectual type film historian commentaries. The speaker purports to be a part of Forever Young films which helped to restore and release Blood Simple on DVD. The stories and facts and preoccupations of the commentator are simply hilarious. He ends up painting an outrageous fictional narrative of his own regarding his involvement with documenting the history of this movie even intersecting with real life events such as the filming of Merchant and Ivory's Jefferson in Paris.
And the intro to the DVD by Mortimer Young must have been written by the Coens themselves and just this short segment rivals the dialogue they have composed for any of their movies ever. It makes me laugh and cry so much in what probably just lasts over a minute of time.
As for the movie Blood Simple itself, it is a solid and unusual thriller, but although the Coens are my favorite filmmakers I can't place them amongst that group of directors whose debut films rival their latter greatness. This is my least favorite of their films. But as the cliché goes, even their worst movie is better to me than the best stuff from most other average filmmakers.
One weird thing though. Did you ever have this rememberence of seeing a movie and remembering a scene from it that never was really there? That happened with this movie. For some reason I remembered Marty coming out of his grave and back to get revenge. I think it was the fact that he was so hard to kill mixed with the dream that Abby has later of him in her apartment. It's weird to remember scenes that never existed though.
Rating: 9/10