Bar Mitzvah Boy Movie Could Be Studio’s Answer
The Coen Brothers’ new comedy, “A Serious Man,” could be the hit for which Focus Features has been looking. The little studio has never had a movie that grossed $100 million domestic. Focus got close to the Oscar for Best Picture with “Brokeback Mountain,” “The Pianist” and “Atonement,” but has never been able to close the deal.
The Coens’ “Burn After Reading” only did $70 million and it had Brad Pitt as its star, kind of. The much admired “Milk” made only $30 million. This year, “Away We Go” and ”Taking Woodstock” — by name directors Sam Mendes and Ang Lee, respectively — were relative disappointments financially. The one true gem in the Focus crown, at least at the boxoffice, was the recent ”Coraline.”
I do not know what size audience awaits “A Serious Man.” The demographic would be bar mitzvah boys circa 1967 to 1970. This means me, and about a half-dozen other people including the Coens. At my press screening there were loads of laughs and many non-Jews in the audience loved it. At the premiere, three people later told me they walked out. They were all Jewish. So here we go.
Joel and Ethan Coen were raised in St. Louis Park, Minn. In 25 years of filmmaking, from “Blood Simple” to “Burn After Reading,” it felt to me like there may have been one Jewish character. I’d say it was Michael Lerner as the studio head in ”The Hudsucker Proxy.” Lerner returns in “A Serious Man” for one brief, hilarious scene.
