Inside Llewyn Davis

I love the Coen Brothers. They are, for my money the best contemporary filmmakers out there. So it was an odd feeling for when last year they put out Inside Llewyn Davis, a movie that explores a singer who is part of the Greenwich Village scene of the early 60s, a music scene that produced Bob Dylan and many others, but the titular character is not the subject of a fictional rags to riches, A Star is Born treatment. Davis is part of the flotsam of that scene, the almost-could-have-beens. I couldn’t bring myself to watch it. But it just came out for home viewing and yesterday I finally brought myself to view it.Inside-Llewyn-Davis-catWhy was it so hard for me to watch it you might be wondering? Mostly because I was afraid that I’d watch it and see myself in Llewyn Davis, all the possibility, all the flaws, the debilitating overconfidence and self-aggrandizing zealotry, the weakness and neediness. And I was right. As I watched the film I saw a representation of my 10 years in New York City as a hopeful songwriter and performer unfold in my mind. No one else would see it, but that’s the beauty of art. You bring yourself to it. It brings you out of it, like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat. It was probably one of the most difficult films for me to watch, but I watched it. And I enjoyed it. And it brought me back to the place where I was the most weak and–just a little bit–reminded me I could be strong. Maybe.I read an article in the New Yorker that discussed how the trip to Chicago was really part of Davis’s “quest” he saw in that journey the choices he would have to make to be what he wanted to be and couldn’t make them. When the Grossman character listened to his (really beautiful) song and said “I don’t hear any money in it” I was crushed. But in a good way, I guess (not really).That whole thing rang very true to me. I seemed and artistic representation of choices we all have to make. It reminded me specifically of choices I definitely made that resulted in my eventual downfall as a musician. I could have tried to take the talents I had and mold them to something that was more commercially viable, but I wanted to write my own stuff. I could have done many things differently. I worked as hard as I possible could for about 8 or 10 years in NYC.One thing I came to know is that at a certain point talent is a given and luck, or placement, or even looks, become what separates. It feels maddeningly arbitrary. But maybe that’s just a story I tell myself to get through the night. Maybe I quit too soon. I spent more time than I wish I would have envying the success of a few others. Some of you know who they are. Maybe they envy as well. I try to be OK with it. I try not to second guess my choices, but it’s hard not to.Should I have taken the record deal we were offered in 2000 even though the terms weren’t the best. After I turned it down I heard that our lawyer was shocked I didn’t take it. He told a friend that he’d never seen an artist turn down a first deal like that, or something. And he was one of the people who advised me not to take it.Should I have asked the 2 dudes who quit the band in ’96 to stay for the SXSW gig where we had several major label folks coming with potential deals on the table instead of curling up in a ball? The Old 97s had occupied the same spot on the bill we filled that year. I don’t know. I don’t think I would have been able to do that at 24. Curling up in a shock-induced ball was probably the only possible reaction for me at the time.375499_10150425602802717_42759962_nFor about 10 years I felt like things were possible. Good things continued to happen along with the not so good. People seemed to think that I was building something, that the next step would come, that I was building a resume. And then it just felt like it was over. Or maybe I was just done with it. Or did I lose my nerve? Errol was there for most of it. Steve was there for some. David and Nancy for a goodly part as well. At any rate, sometime in my 33rd year I just felt like I had deflated and it was over. Was that when the drinking really started? Or had the drinking been going on all along and that’s part of why it never happened? I could kill myself with questions if I let myself go on.That’s what Inside Llewyn Davis brought out in me, and I kind of knew it would. That’s part of the success of the film. It shows the grinding of an artistic life, no matter how small, pointless or ill-advised. it shows the choices people make even when they don’t understand they’re making choices and the audience can feel how those choices will ripple out and resonate in the mind of the chooser for the rest of their lives.There are plenty of excuses I could make. Star City put out our last record right before 9/11. We were enjoying a lot of critical “buzz” at the time. After 9/11 we had to cancel tour dates and we never regained our momentum after that. The record deal stuff I mentioned above. We happened to be gaining momentum just as the music industry was dying. Etc. Etc.I’m still extremely proud of the work we did. I would put it up against other stuff that had more “success” and feel like it stands up, if not outshines, much of that stuff. But in my darkest moments that’s cold comfort. I had a dream. I’m not even sure these days what specifically that dream entailed, other than “Get a record deal, make records, do that forever.” It seems painfully naive now. It’s incredibly hard not to be bitter and sad about it. Sometimes I succeed in that. Sometimes I don’t.Sometimes I wonder if I’m actually insane. They say that the definition of crazy is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. A couple years after I receded from my music career I ended up coming to Iowa to become a writer. And of course I had early signs that maybe I could build something from that. And then the publishing industry fell apart as well. The only difference is this time I knew to expect it. I still get up and write, even though I know not many people in the larger scheme of things will probably ever read or hear my work. I try every day to be thankful for those who have and hopeful that I was able to add something to their lives with that work. And I know I have to just let it all go. But I keep doing it. Does that mean I’m insane? I like to think no.It’s hard. We’re conditioned as a culture to define success in a certain way–public, spectacular, mythical. And because of that I’ll always feel like a failure. Next month I’m playing a show with Jason Isbell (a songwriter very similar to me but much more successful). I worked really hard to get that gig. And now I wonder why. Every time I think about it I try to see myself through his eyes, which is pointless but I can’t stop myself. And I see him seeing me as a sad, failed hobbyist. It breaks my heart to think like that. But that’s what it is.And that’s OK, right? Or it’ll have to be OK. I don’t have a lot of choice in the matter. So thanks, Coen Brothers and Inside Llewyn Davis, for helping me dredge all this back up and explore it in the most narcissistic way possible. I’d be remiss if I didn’t admit that while I’m typing this I’m secretly hoping one of the Coen Brothers reads it and wonders, “Who is this heart-wrenching forgotten artist? We must know him and bring his work to the world!”Sad. What a sad, needy bastard I am.

This film missed the mark for me, since the publicity promised much more than the film actually delivered. I hadn't caught it in the theaters, but I finally got the DVD. I approached the film as someone who had personal experience with the people and scenes of the "Urban Folk Era" in the 60's. I had worked as a singer-songwriter in the late 60's and early 70's. I was prepared for a film that looked into the essence of what drove Llewyn Davis as an individual artist within his microcosm, even as the macrocosm of the folk revival in Greenwich Village and the entire country was building all around him. I heard in interviews that I'd see a little of the Chicago scene (a room said to be The Gaslight, as it turned out), and maybe even Boston-Cambridge (where I was), and other key places -- possibly a major folk festival. I found little of the Village, let alone the other scenes.Instead, the Coen Brothers, able as they are, gave us a small story about a dysfunctional young working class male, who happened to be a folk singer. There was very little about his music or his performances. We don't get a good look "inside" Llewyn Davis. We never find out what drove him to be a folk musician in the first place. As I recall of that time, discovering or writing compelling music was "the grail" for those in the folk music scene. Something essential to our culture was propelling people into it. For Llewyn Davis, however, the music only seemed to get him out of working as a merchant marine sailor like his dad, and it made him interesting to a number of women who took him to their beds -- one of whom he casually impregnated. That was likely accurate about life in the Village, but getting laid and getting abortions (illegal at the time) were coincidental, albeit, as with the "Counter Culture" to come after the "Folk Era," a wide variety of mistakes and rip-offs were common enough among the players, and, as within any Bohemian subculture, morality is always a constant experiment.Around Llewyn Davis's urban folk "nightmare," there was a growing generation of self-styled folk singers, mentored by folk icons like Pete Seeger, who had not only ridden freight trains with Woody Guthrie, he had earned his degree from Harvard (and he wasn't the only university grad on the scene). Something more than freeloading off rich fans or bilking prosperous supporters or taking loans from club owners overshadowed Llewyn Davis's small life, leaving it irrelevant to most in the end. Davis, as depicted, was clueless about his path to success or significance. In those days, you had to do more than just carry a guitar to be in the folk scene at all. It wasn't about making moves on admirers, it was about taking out your guitar, stepping up to the mike, and letting something bigger than you come through you to move people. Often the performer was as surprised as the audience, when it finally happened. There were the perks afterward, but you still had to step up again and again and again to be relevant (or paid).I had read that "Llewyn Davis" (Welsh roots, like mine) was an amalgamation of several performers, including Dave Van Ronk. Van Ronk may have been many things in his time, but he was at least respected as a voracious collector and interpreter of urban blues, jug band tunes, and a whole lot of other tunes. We younger players were in awe of that, if nothing else. A look at his discography will easily show why. His guitar-playing was his own amalgamation and a competent one -- very respectful of and always fitting his material. He was fiercely conscientious as a performer and knew many other performers, as well as some foundational figures of The Blues whose music that had been collected from the South over the previous three decades. Van Ronk's tenure as the "Mayor of Bleecker Street" suddenly trailed off when a younger singer-songwriter rival, Bob Dylan, literally changed his tune and left Van Ronk and many others irreversibly in the past, including the fictional Llewyn Davis. Dylan's ascendency and its impact might have inspired a character-driven film, but the Coens chose to follow Llewyn Davis down (to coin an Eric Von Schmidt line).Was Davis just another variety of Coen sociopath? If so, why spend precious budget on this one? Llewyn Davis appeared to be unaware of civil rights or anti-war efforts or the Beat Generation, to say nothing of the folk music lineage that was flowing like a tidal surge into the Village. As depicted, Davis was also very casual about performing his own music, even though some of it clearly came from mining the same sources of English and Irish ballads that Joan Baez and others mined at the same time. It was the early ascendancy of the singer-songwriter, but Davis was not ascending. He appeared throughout the film as a loner and a user to no good end but mere survival. Many others who failed to "make it" as folk singers left the scene to find more productive paths. (Others moved to Florida or California, etc., for less stress.)Young white urban folk singer-songwriters be could be heard singing studied laments about trains leaving stations without them, a common Delta Blues theme. So we watched Davis's personal train leave without him, in the scene where a rapidly evolving Bob Dylan took the stage as Davis was leaving the club (The Bitter End?) feeling sorry for himself. Dylan was performing his newest, soon-to-shake-the-world music, vs. earlier material he had learned from the work of Woody Guthrie, other senior folk singers, and various musicologists. As we learned later, Dylan had met, loved, and was deeply moved by Suze Rotolo, who became his musical catalyst, but there was no woman around Davis who inspired him anywhere above the waist.How could the Coen brothers fall so short? They are, after all, celebrated authors and directors of fascinating character-driven films. Ideally, "Inside Llewyn Davis" could have been one of those. They might have portrayed a singularly-driven white urban folk musician, possessed by a passion to achieve something of genuine worth with his music, such that it ruled his life and set all his priorities in relationships, finances/business deals, living arrangements, etc. I don't see the Coens making a film like that, but one can hope...Instead, we see a weary Davis in Chicago during his pivotal encounter with "folk music godfather" Albert Grossman (whom I knew much later), having been referred to Albert by his club-owner friend (Fred Weintraub?). Albert brusquely shatters Llewyn's rainbow. He assures Llewyn that he doesn't have it. Albert has no use for him as a headliner -- no money there -- find a partner or maybe not. It is brutal feedback. This is when Albert was building up the careers of Peter, Paul, and Mary, Bob Dylan, and others. In the film, Davis had endured a hellish journey from New York to Chicago in the ice and snow, so one might infer that this shot was important to him. Yet there is no fire in Davis when he meets his possible destiny. There is no vow from Davis afterwards to fight on after, with or without the Grossman touch. As Davis returns, defeated, to New York, there can be no tragedy, because Davis had no critical mission, no holy grail to find, nothing greater than his own appetites and self-deception to fight for. He will not be a vessel or conduit for greatness. He will not make a difference. He will continue to be his own victim. If he doesn't care, why do we?That kind of scenario no doubt occurred for various others -- perhaps the Coens knew about someone who lived it. Even in my own story, however, the music and the scene were everything, but the music business was not, and so I turned to other ways to make a living -- I'm glad for that now. A happier outcome occurred more often than what was depicted in the film, but not for this kind of character. Besides, there was the Vietnam War just heating up, and soon a single male outside a college would easily draw a "1A" Draft classification and be bound for Southeast Asia, far away from the Newport Folk Festival. Llewyn was likely headed that way, and not with the Merchant Marine. There were many challenges that prevented most of us from taking up a folksinger's life, attractive though that may have seemed. I'm sorry the Coen Brothers chose to tell such a small story set in the Village of that era -- a story that ended not with a bang nor a whimper (to coin Eliot), but just a sigh.Though the film was about a character, not the "folk scene," I recall so many more memorable characters from that time -- some of my favorites involving couples, like Ian and Sylvia (down from Canada) or Richard and Mimi Farina. Not all had happy endings. There is a whole book-full of them -- "Baby Let Me Follow You Down," by Eric Von Schmidt, a key player in the Boston-Cambridge scene. I recall the subtly significant contribution of "Mr. Tambourine Man," the young Bruce Langhorne, whose electrified, bell-like Martin guitar arpeggio's graced a number of key albums of the era, including Dylan's "Bringing It All Back Home" (with Albert Grossman's wife Sarah on the album cover). And what about Dylan's muse, Suze Rotolo, who is shown walking with him arm-in-arm in the West Village on the cover of "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan"? Suze Rotolo's largely untold story would seem worthy of a film, if not a Coen Brothers film (she was not flawed or wounded enough, perhaps). She was an historical-stature muse and we know the 20th Century had them -- lots of prime material for a character-driven film. Of course, none of these characters were obvious sociopaths, or the victims of sociopaths, and so they may never drive a Coen Brothers film.Perhaps the Coens will embark on another project addressing a more compelling character in the Folk Music Era in New York and elsewhere. (Does the character have to be a sociopath?) "Inside Llewyn Davis" only used the Village of the 60's as a set, not the character it deserved to be. I am glad this movie allows me a small taste of those times and those people. Anyone out there working on a next attempt?

This purchase of the DVD was 100% useless ... the DVD was only usable for REGION 1 which is the USA .. and as Australia is Region 4 it was a total waste of money . Further when you look at the DVD on your Amazon. com. au site there is NO indication that this DVD is for region 1 only. Therefore I am now very unlikely to buy DVD’s from your site !!!

リージョンBなので、普通のプレーヤーではみれない。自分も　見れない。失敗でした。

To the extent this film is subversive, it’s an existential deconstruction of the American Dream. It questions ideas about art and talent, showing the lengths to which some will go to suffer for them.It’s the winter of 1960-61 and we’re in New York’s Greenwich Village. It’s cold, grey and blustery, snow piled high along the pavement, people hunched and huddled in overcoats as they walk. Among them is Llewyn Davis, a folk singer of about 30. He looks ragged because he is, homeless because poor, and poor because gigs in the local clubs (dingy cellar bars) barely pay. At present he’s living on the charity and kindness of friends. They feed him, lend him floor or couch space for a night or two. It’s tough and requires patience, self-belief, determination and a sense of humour, qualities Llewyn appears to lack. Instead he’s short tempered, sullen, stubborn. What charm he possesses emerges when he loses himself in song. There with his acoustic guitar he becomes sensitive, calm, soulful, his voice pure, even sweet. The small audiences he plays for seem to acknowledge this. They listen thoughtfully. He is not hooted and booed. The basket gets passed round and he earns a few bucks. But the folkie crowd is bohemian, not rich. Tourists don’t come to the Village. Not yet at any rate. Instead: artists, poets, actors, fellow musicians, all of whom are far off the capitalist mainline. They come to smoke, drink, chat, relax, not redistribute wealth. These places are their spiritual homes, places such as the Gaslight, Gerdes Folk City and others.Llewyn’s problems are many. First, as noted, he’s poor and homeless. In addition, he’s a solo act now because of tragedy. His partner Mike (half the duo of Timlin and Davis) committed suicide, jumping to his death from the George Washington Bridge. Half an act and half a man now. No harmony vocals anymore without Mike. No fiddle, mandolin or banjo accompaniment. No camaraderie and the solidarity of shared experiences, high and low. No partner in crime any longer, if it’s criminal to smoke, drink and sing folk songs. That’s the problem with suicide, or one of them. It destroys many, not just one. We see Llewyn struggle in the wake of this one, bereft and abandoned.However, some minor redemption: into his life a cat wanders. He’s gentle and seldom meows. He’s also observant and patient with a kind of stoic dignity that seems to take the world as it comes. He looks calm and peaceful, the mirror opposite of Llewyn, agitated as he is by all the worrying problems he’s caught up in.One of these is aesthetic. The starving artist in his garret, pure and unsullied in sensitive contemplation, is a romantic residue of the 19th century. But Llewyn doesn’t see it as a conceit and thus is limited by it. The musicians around him who succeed commercially are careerists and sell-outs, he says, which raises the question, implied but unspoken in the film, “What exactly is it that Llewyn is trying to do?” Art for art’s sake is a reasonable ideal if one can afford it. But if one can’t, as Llewyn clearly can’t, we’re entitled to ask: “What’s the point?”The film is a road film in a sense, and the second half of it literally becomes one. But largely it’s a journey of the spirit, a quest for meaning and purpose. In the ancient Homeric sagas the heroes were led by signs, portents, omens, animals. The world was symbolic and full of signifiers. Odysseus, who journeyed to find the Golden Fleece, was led by these. Llewyn in his way is led by the cat, whose name we later learn is Ulysses. Toward the end of the film Llewyn pauses outside a movie theatre. The poster there is for the Disney film The Incredible Journey and shows three animals, one of whom is a cat.The cat belongs to good friends of Llewyn’s called the Gorfeins (Mitch and Lillian). They live on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, not in the Village. They are well off, Mitch a university professor. Liberal, open minded, bohemian in spirit, they are fans of Llewyn and most likely saw him perform at the Gaslight or elsewhere. They won’t allow him to suffer, so when he needs to crash on their sofa their door is wide open to him. But of course he has pride and only reluctantly and sporadically accepts. Earlier on in the film he is staying with the Gorfeins. He sleeps on their sofa. In the morning, waking up, Llewyn finds he is not alone. The cat sits Buddha-like on his chest, calm and composed. The camera angle is low and looks up from Llewyn’s point of view. From there Ulysses looks grand like a beautiful statue. He’s fluffy and pudgy, tawny coloured with green eyes. Llewyn looks at him with amusement, since he’s used to sleeping with women, not cats.Llewyn rises, eats a bowl of cereal, strums his guitar and sings. The Gorfeins are out, so he and the cat are alone. Llewyn must go out too and does. But just as he opens the door to leave, Ulysses darts from the flat as he’s closing the door. It locks and he hasn’t got a key, so he runs down the corridor after him, catching him.What to do? He can’t spend his entire day walking around New York City and the Village with a cat. So he calls on friend Jean in her tiny flat. Jean is a folk singer too, one half of a duo called Jim and Jean, Jim being her husband. Jean is not happy to see Llewyn. There are problems and complications between them. Llewyn leaves the cat with her and goes out. When he returns another folk singer named Troy Nelson is crashing with Jim and Jean. Llewyn needs to stay over tonight too and will return the cat to the Gorfeins tomorrow. Jean is furious and says there is no space for the two of them. But the reason for her fury is not accommodation. She’s angry because she’s pregnant, which she informs Llewyn of by silently handing a note to him in Troy’s presence. It is no love note. It’s accusatory and condemning.The next day they walk alone in a nearby park. Is the baby forming in Jean’s womb Llewyn’s? Naturally, he wants to know. She’s angry, indignant, and curses him. He’s no gentleman. He’s nothing but a randy homeless bum. Her words hurt but Llewyn does his best to deflect them. How can she know it’s his? Because she and Jim are always careful, she says. Llewyn is the reckless, irresponsible one. Who else’s could it be?Jean needs an abortion and Llewyn must pay for it. He’s broke but agrees. It will cost him $200. He knows the fee already because it’s not the first time he has had to pay for one. Diane, another woman, was impregnated by him. She too, it seems, did not want his child. But later he discovers this wasn’t the case. When he visits his private doctor to tell her about Jean, the doctor reveals that he never performed the operation on Diane, abortion aborted. She moved back to her hometown of Akron, Ohio and had the baby there. That was two years ago. The doctor never found out where Llewyn was living and thus didn’t return the money to him. But he’s honest enough now to tell Llewyn all this and say there’ll be no charge for Jean’s operation.Meanwhile Ulysses is gone. He jumped from the window and ran down the fire escape of Jean’s flat. Llewyn was frantic when it happened. He had just risen that morning and the window was barely open. But Ulysses didn’t like it there and dashed. So did Llewyn — in barefeet and T-shirt on a cold February morning. But to no avail. Ulysses has disappeared.The Gorfeins were understandably upset and worried when they returned home and found both Llewyn and the cat gone. “Where is he?” they want to know. They ask by phone. Llewyn stands outside, shivering at a pay phone. “Don’t worry,” he lies, the cat’s at Jean’s. He’ll return it to them tomorrow.By the miracle and magic of cinema Llewyn finds the cat the next day. Llewyn is in a dingy restaurant with Jean near Jean’s flat. She’s bad mouthing him, repeating a profanity as if she’s got Tourette Syndrome, her normally beautiful face contorted and ugly. Llewyn winces at the sound of the epithet. He looks out the window then suddenly jumps from his seat, dashing from the restaurant. He runs down the pavement, grabs Ulysses by the tail, pulls him back into his loving arms. Jean won’t love him. The world won’t love his music. But Ulysses is warm, furry and fat. He purrs when Llewyn holds him. The odyssey of Ulysses is over, it seems. Except it isn’t. Ulysses is still missing. This is the wrong cat. Llewyn doesn’t know it until he returns it to the Gorfeins. They are horrified. He is mortified.Stuck with the stray cat, he flees New York for a spell. A fellow musician named Al Cody has a car that two buddies of his are driving to Chicago. Llewyn, his guitar and cat hitch a ride with them. Johnny Five is at the wheel, a shifty-looking character who says nothing for miles on end along the frozen, foggy highway. In the back is dissipated Roland Turner, a loud-mouthed, cynical, condescending braggart who thinks he’s a brilliant jazz musician. Folk singers are circus performers to be laughed at.The ride from New York to Chicago is long. Llewyn makes it; Johnny Five, Roland Turner and the cat do not. Johnny is arrested and taken into custody by the Highway Patrol. Roland and the cat are abandoned in the car by Llewyn. He hitch-hikes the rest of the way to Chicago, a place just as cold and bleak as New York. There he goes to the Gate of Horn, a folkie theatre run by Bud Grossman, publisher and distributor of Troy Nelson’s records. In fact Llewyn is only here because Troy recommended Grossman. A month ago Llewyn sent Grossman his new solo record, Inside Llewyn Davis, which Grossman hasn’t listened to. Thus the title of the album which will fail to sell becomes the ironic title of the film.Grossman says he doesn’t need to listen to the album. Llewyn has his guitar, so play it. Llewyn does. Grossman sits and listens, his face impassive. Llewyn sings his heart out for him, sings an old traditional ballad from the record called The Death of Queen Jane. Later Dylan will borrow from it and call his own song Queen Jane Approximately.Llewyn is beautiful, his voice and phrasing sublime, his strumming low key but perfect. It is a perfect song. You hear it and know it. But Grossman doesn’t hear it, isn’t interested in its beauty. Llewyn finishes. Grossman says:“I don’t see a lot of money here.”No, he doesn’t. That’s what he doesn’t see — a lot of money. He suggests Llewyn join a folk group he’s forming (probably Peter, Paul and Mary, because Bud Grossman is Albert Grossman in reality, the folk titan who managed them and many other acts, including, most famously later on, Bob Dylan himself). No, thanks, says Llewyn. He doesn’t do harmonies for others. You should be in a duo, then, says Grossman. You need another voice. Ever think about that? Llewyn wanders away into the snow, no direction home.But he does return. He hitches a ride and does all the driving. He passes a highway sign that says Akron but doesn’t take the turn-off. He hits a tawny cat on the highway, or thinks he does. It might have been the stray he left behind with Roland Turner a day or two ago. It’s all foggy — both the highway and his head. Nothing makes sense anymore.Many other incidents and characters occur in the film: Llewyn’s single-mom sister Joy (chronically unhappy), his silent and resigned father who’s in a nursing home, the office of the Merchant Marines which Llewyn visits in desperation with the thought of going to sea again.But what matters most is the music, which brilliantly flows through this film. That is, if you like folk music. Jean tells Llewyn when they meet again that he’s on the bill tonight at the Gaslight if he wants to play. She went to the owner and told him Llewyn needs the money. Llewyn says there won’t be much in the basket. She says it’ll only be half a basket, as there’s another act on the bill tonight. She also says the Times will be present in the audience, an idea that Llewyn sniffs at.The Times did show, as in The New York Times, but it wasn’t at the Gaslight that night but at Gerde’s Folk City where the Times reporter Robert Shelton sat and listened to Dylan some months later. His piece appeared in the Times on 29 September 1961. Headline: 20-Year-Old is Bright New Face at Gerde’s Club. Shelton was widely respected and had connections. One was John Hammond at Columbia Records. There the eponymous album Bob Dylan was recorded in a day or two in 1962. Thus did the revolution begin and nothing in the Village, at Newport, or in the wider world beyond would be the same again.The last we see of Llewyn is outside the Gaslight in an alley. It’s February, it’s cold, and some hick from Hibbing (Minnesota) is crooning on stage, yet another wannabe on the folkie trail of tears. But Llewyn doesn’t hear what the others hear that night. He’s part of the old guard, the world of Pete Seeger, the Weavers, Woody Guthrie and Dave Van Ronk. In fact, his character is vaguely patterned after that of Van Ronk, affectionately known in the Village as he was as the Mayor of MacDougal Street.Llewyn’s face is hurting, partly stinging from the biting cold, but also from a punch he has just taken to the face, beaten up by an angry and vengeful man. Who? The husband of a country gal from Arkansas who played the washboard at the Gaslight the other night. Llewyn stupidly stood up and ridiculed her as a hayseed, thinking himself superior to her.The camera holds on Llewyn’s face. His eyes are blank as they gaze at the dark, empty night sky. And in those eyes we see the truth, one which tells us this man is going nowhere.

Truly wonderful, lingers on in the memory days after.

Les frères Coen ont non seulement un talent pour créer des situations drôles dans le malheur mais possèdent aussi une immense culture musicale de leur pays. Après O Brother voici un autre pan de cette musique qui montre la difficulté de réussir à percer et annonce l'arrivée d'un certain Bob Dylan.