I must admit to being slightly puzzled while re-watching the Coen Brothers remake of The Ladykillers. It's been several years since I late viewed the film (possibly the first time in its entirety since the theatrical release), and while I can't reverse my opinion that it's my least favorite Coen Brothers movie, it's not on account of The Ladykillers being an awful movie. It's not even necessarily a bad movie.
The Ladykillers is, however, a mess; it is a jumbled concoction of good ideas, bad execution, and outright baffling decisions.
For example, I like much of the camerawork early in the film. In fact, the camera movement is one of the strengths of The Ladykillers. The Brothers Coen set up visual motifs quickly, and it's not hard to see where the film is going in the first fifteen minutes, whether or not you've seen the original.
Both versions are about a group of criminals setting up their operation in the home of an kindly old lady. When the inevitable tension arises, disposing of the old woman becomes much more difficult than they imagined. In the original version, Alec Guinness played the role of Professor Marcus, the leader of hooligans disguised as musicians. In the 2004 remake, Tom Hanks takes over as Professor G.H. Dorr, PHD.
But Hanks isn't really the problem in The Ladykillers. Despite that fact that he chews scenery as thought it were covered in honey, Tom Hanks fits very well into the Coen Brothers universe. Like George Clooney and Nicolas Cage before him, Hanks isn't afraid to get silly. There's an underplayed hint of menace about Dorr early in the film that never really plays out, but this is more on the side of the auteur writer/directors than the star.
In fact, much of what doesn't work in The Ladykillers rests on the shoulders of Joel and Ethan Coen. The film can be maddeningly schizophrenic with its tone and characters, particularly the rest of Dorr's crew. J.K. Simmons finds himself working out of a tough spot early in the film after his character is introduced killing a dog (much to the chagrin of commercial-within-a-movie director Greg Grunberg and ASPCA Rep. Bruce Campbell). That none of his subsequent character work or the Mountain Girl subplot never registers is in part because of the awkward first impression. Oh, the Irritable Bowel Syndrome introduced later doesn't help either.
Believe me, I understand that The Ladykillers is trying to juxtapose the world of the sacred and the world of the profane, and while the Coens get the sacred spot on, the profane is wildly inconsistent, giving the movie an almost anachronistic tone. Scenes that are merely between Hanks and Hall are great, but when Marlon Wayans is dragged in playing a far too out of place "lost soul", the slapstick wears thin quickly.
Part of it is that The Ladykillers feels like a remake that tries too hard to keep the spirit (and the black comedy) of the original but that isn't a "period" film. It makes sense, considering that O Brother Where Art Thou and The Man Who Wasn't There are "period" films, and while Intolerable Cruelty is set in 2003, it feels like a screwball comedy in tone. The Ladykillers does not find that balance so easily. It often feels like an uncomfortable mishmash of the 1950s and 2004.
This is not to say there aren't small touches I still enjoy. Irma P. Hall is uniformly excellent as Marva Munson, and I love her obsession with the one "hippity hop" song she can identify, A Tribe Called Quest's "I Left My Wallet in El Segundo". Had the film tried less to incorporate "modern" influences and simply focused on Munson and Dorr, it might be more palatable. Other little things amuse me, like the way Lump (Ryan Hurst) calls the Professor "coach", or Munson's cat constantly staring at the criminals with anthropomorphized disdain. And the recurring portrait of Munson's late husband, Othar, is chuckle inducing in its mere presence.
At the same time, I can't say that it holds up any better than it did five years ago, and I can't see myself rushing to see it again (although I suspect it will make a cursory appearance in the Coen auteur class next spring), but it's not bad. Just very curiously put together, and not in ways I think are defensible. Thoughts, anyone?
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