“If that was me, i would have killed that man.”
This review is spoiler-free.
Fargo is a remake of the classic Coen Brothers film of the same name that was released in 1996. It changes the character names and situations from the original, and seems to become a completely different monster altogether. It follows Lester Nygaard (Martin Freeman) as he is tormented by life in general. After meeting Lorne Malvo (Billy Bob Thornton), who offers to kill someone who has been tormenting him, Nygaard begins to follow a dark, violent path, which leads him into making some decisions that he will probably regret. As this happens, Greta Grimly (Joey King) begins to track the case.
The cast are great, all emulating the vibe given from the original film. Although, i was surprised how much different it was from the film – the characters had all been changed, and it seemed like only the messages, and ideas surrounding life remained, as well as the setting. That really is how a remake should always be handled. It shouldn’t religiously recreate the original, but it should reference it subtly, while making the situations different. Billy Bob Thornton has the stand out performance, as his characters is so malicious and evil, that i loved to hate him. At the same time, he gave off an anti-hero vibe which made him strangely likable at rare times. He was terrifying. The other two main players were very good too, with Freeman’s descent into madness being highly engrossing to watch. Grimly gave a good performance also, but as her character was the stand out part in the original, where she was famously played by the fantastic Francis MacDormand, she fails to ever be as good as her original actress. This is a hard act to follow, but hopefully she will succeed to impress more in later episodes.
The direction was fine, but after having the Coen’s direct the source material, no director can really live up to that. It did, however, come off as a much darker piece than the original though, which i liked. Cinematography was good, if a bit simple. It had a sharp script that slightly lacked the humor of the original, but achieved portraying cruelty and malice very well.
The story was spot on for me, showing the idea of a man corrupting himself to try and do some good of the original film and turning it up to eleven. It was mad, with crazed, twisted, unexpected and bloody sequences continuously shocking. But thankfully these scenes were few and far between, leaving lots of time for great character development and plot intrigue.
I will be reviewing every episode of this ten episode mini-series, and after this review, the others will be spoiler filled.
Harvey Gardner 