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I can't quite put my finger on what's so unique and lovely about black-and-white film. Maybe it's how it gives certain subjects a combination of otherworldly allure and gritty, harsh reality. I've noticed how B & W seems to cast deeper shadows on life and elevate the most mundane topics to surreal proportions, like German Expressionism in the 1920's or the Mystery-Thrillers of the 1940's. This is what occurs in The Man Who Wasn't There, The Coen Brothers latest exercise in genre deconstruction. Thanks to Roger Deakins breathtaking cinematography, this modern existential film noir is one of the more absorbing films of 2001.

The Man Who Wasn't There refers to the small-town barber, Ed Crane (Billy Bob Thornton), who narrates in a soothing deadpan style. Thornton, with a lone cigarette almost constantly clenched between his teeth and cynically detached from life, is the quintessential noir protagonist. Crane lives a relatively quiet existence giving haircuts in his Brother-in-law, Frank's (Michael Badalucco) barbershop. Frank's an overly talkative, yet affable enough fellow, who counterbalances Ed's silent contemplative visage. Ed is married to Frank's sister, Doris (Joel Coen's real-life spouse, Frances McDormand), a bookkeeper at the town department store. From all outward appearances, Doris and Ed seem fairly normal, yet both feel an emptiness in their lives. Ed in particular comes across like he's just marking time in his marriage, career and existence. Just wasting space; Like he never existed. Doris, on the other hand, is hiding her true feelings behind stern behavior. She's a tough-as-nails boozer, who tends to speak her mind at the most inappropriate of moments. She also happens to be having an affair with her boss, the dapper Big Dave Brewster (James Gandolfini), owner of the local department store.

Nothing of major importance happens in the Cranes lives (other than Doris cheating on Ed). Until one day, along comes a oily-looking salesman (Jon Polito), with stories about "the wave of the future...Dry Cleaning". From there on out, Ed's life seems to come apart at the seams. Ed appears to be drawn in by Polito's seemingly sincere pitch and decides to become a silent partner in the scheme. To raise the money necessary to invest in Polito's scheme, he works up a plan to blackmail Gandolfini, using Thornton's knowledge about Doris' infidelity against him. Not surprisingly, things don't go as planned. Through circumstances I don't wish to reveal, the plan backfires (as they inevitably do in noir thriller's) and turns into murder. Gandolfini ends up dead, McDormand is wrongly accused of the crime and Polito skips town. Polito is the only one who knows a crucial secret that might prove McDormand innocent, leaving her and Thornton high and dry.

With money that Thornton and Badalucco raise, they hire an out-of-town lawyer (Tony Shalhoub), who's quick, blunt and to the point. He plans on using every trick in the book to get McDormand off. But McDormand doesn't seem very happy at the idea. In fact, as events reveal themselves, she hasn't been happy for years. Most likely, she doesn't even want to go back to Thornton.

As if there weren't enough problems for ol' Billy Bob, more and more evidence seems to be pointing towards him as the culprit behind Gandolfini's murder (did he? I'm not telling). To top it off, he seems to be developing a Lolita-Humbert relationship with Birdy (Scarlett Johannson), a teenager who is less than the typical wholesome 1940's teen. Thornton is interested in her, because of her piano playing skills. He thinks that she has potential to became a great musician. But he is also interested, because he is feeling more and more like "a ghost", . He clings to Johannson desperately, like a life preserver, even as he gets sucked further into a void of his own creation. The horror of it all is Thornton feels as if he needs to go into that void.

Like most Coen Brothers flicks, this is full of the usual manipulations of genre films and our expectations. Players in the story, that seem like caricatures at first, end up doing things just a little out of step with the genre they're in. Unlike most Coen films, however, this is probably the most somber of their productions. There is very little of the mischief and "just-kidding" attitude of something like Fargo, Big Lebowski and O Brother, Where Art Thou?. Except for a rather loopy subplot involving UFO paranoia, Joel and Ethan Coen proceed with the utmost seriousness. Or at least, as close as the Coen's ever get to seriousness. If it's possible, the actors do it even more so.

Thornton, with his world-weary way of speaking and his lined, weathered visage, is the personification of noir anti-hero cool. He uses very little facial movement, nor does he force his vocal range to overemphasize what's happening to him. Mostly, he acts through the eyes. Those are two of the loneliest windows into the soul I've ever seen. McDormand is a perfect match with Thornton, when it comes to understatement in acting. She displays a hard exterior, but suggests just by subtle body movement years of internal turmoil. She married Thornton when she was young, pretty much as a marriage of convenience. Both are paying the price for it, as their lives drift further away from the "real world" and into oblivion.

No Coen Brothers production (as usual, Joel directs, Ethan produces and both write the script) would be complete without meticulous production design or a quirky supporting cast. The main players are rounded out by Coen Regulars like Polito, Shalhoub and Badalucco. Shalhoub in particular makes his sharky lawyer into something unique. He talks so rapidly, it's as if he's compressing ten pages worth of dialogue into two sentences. Gandolfini, in The Man Who Wasn't There, his role as Big Dave, plays him like Tony Soprano on low boil. If anything, he comes off more sinister than his TV alter ego. Only Gandolfini could display simmering menace out of relatively benign gestures, like jovial backslapping or smoking a cigar.

This type of atmosphere wouldn't have the charge it has, if it had been shot in color. That's why special thanks should go to Deakins polished black and white camerawork. It pays homage to the mystery-thrillers of the past, but seems so shiny and new, it makes you feel as if B&W never went away. Deakins work isn't just a seperate character in the movie, it practically builds the framework of the movie. The overall feel of the story just wouldn't work if it was displayed in bright gaudy colors. The monochrome world in which Ed Crane exists is correctly overcast, with expressionistic corners and sinister beings hidden in the shadows. If you don't believe me, look at the eerie scene where Gandolfini's widow pays a midnight visit to Thornton, with that spidery veil of hers. Try and tell me that THAT would have worked in color?

If there are any flaws, they tend to come in the Thornton-Johannson relationship. It rings a little bit like American Beauty redux, but without much of the erotic energy. In fact, that's kind of a minor problem with the Coen's directing as well. They tend to distance their characters emotions from the situations they're in. They do it so successfully that, if it weren't for the wonderful ensemble work of the actors, we would be hard pressed to care for any of them. But thanks to the quietly powerful performances of Thornton and Co., and the sure-footed directing, this is one of the few times I wish we lived in a black-and-white world.

My Rating =

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