Raising Arizona (1987)

 Raising Arizona (1987)

In 1984, The Coen Brothers introduced themselves to the filmmaking world with their brilliant debut, Blood Simple. That film proved that the auteurs mastered the art of storytelling. Three years later, they released one of their career-best (out of many career-best, lots of subjectivity) films, Raising Arizona. This little gem proved that they mastered the art of dialogue. Sure, everyone has weird accents but that does not change the fact that the screenplay, also written by the Coen’s, is gold. This movie is the very beginning of their particular style of word usage that will come to define them over the next several decades. I know many old-school critics felt the film was shallow or were surprised at what they saw, but many consider this one of their best films. It is hilarious, has characters you will never forget, a fantastic screenplay, a wonderful score, great cinematography, and just that sense of weirdness you will come to love. It feels like one of those strange Nicolas Cage movies. Wait a second, this is one of those strange Nic Cage movies.

After the success of Blood Simple, The Coen Brothers wanted to shift gears and create something more uplifting. After the tension and the darkness of that film, can you blame them? Despite the main character H.I breaking the law a million times, the Coen’s worked to make their characters sympathetic. And it worked! Despite the laws being broke and crimes being committed, you feel for the plight of H.I and his girlfriend. I found it interesting how the ideas for the dialects were created. It is a mixture of local dialect combined with eccentricities from local magazines and the Bible. They surely are weird, but this is supposed to be a weird movie, right? The directors brought back most of the production crew from their debut film such as Carter Burwell creating the score (and actually made yodeling not annoying) and Barry Sonnenfeld behind the camera who really did some excellent work.

This film is about a man named H.I. McDonnough (Nicolas Cage) who has made a living on holding up convenience stores and going to jail. After one such encounter, he falls in love with policewoman, Ed (Holly Hunter). There is just one problem. Ed is unable to conceive a baby. She convinces him to steal a baby from rich car salesman, Nathan Arizona (Trey Wilson). After all, his wife gave birth to five babies. They aren’t going to miss one, right? As they go about their plan, they encounter fellow convicts from the law; Gale (John Goodman) and Evelle (William Forsythe) and Leonard Smalls (Randall ‘Tex’ Cobb) who looks like he could be part of the Hells Angels gang and has been tasked with retrieving the baby.

The actors clearly had a great time making the movie. Say what you want about the accents, but the performances themselves are amazing. Can you imagine this Nic Cage character carrying around pampers and acting as a father? No, but it is hilarious to watch anyway. The Coen Brothers wrote Holly Hunter’s part with her in mind. So, it is no surprise she killed the role. John Goodman became a Coen Brother regular after his winning performance. He was part of the riotously hilarious bank robbery scene that had me rolling around in laughter. “Where are the bank tellers?” “Here, sir!” This is the PG way of saying it, but this line delivery was hilarious. Trey Wilson is great as the bombastic Arizona Sr. Hey, keep an eye out for Frances McDormand.

Without a doubt, Raising Arizona is a comedic tour-de-force. It’s not for everyone, especially those with an old-school mentality. Regardless, The Coen Brothers crafted a special film that introduced their style that would flourish in years to come. The movie was a big hit and Ethan Coen would later say that this would be their last film to bring in hordes of money (not exactly true), but the world of cinema was gifted when these auteurs made this film. It’s funny, strange, and has one of the best bank robbery sequences.

My Grade: A