I knew I was entering the world of the insane when I picked this up. I wasn't disappointed. This is a dark comedy where people don't talk to each other, they just talk. Barton Fink is a big phony one hit wonder. He has these high ideals which he really doesn't understand. He's unable to see the forest for the trees. When he meets John Goodman's character, Charlie, he has an opportunity to find his muse, but he doesn't even listen. When he does, it's too late. The events of this film are wonderful, from Barton's speeches and his block. To Mayhew, the ersatz Faulkner, who drinks constantly and screeches. Barton Fink is so unlikeable that we don't even care what happens to him in other than a casual way. Goodman steals every scene he is in and ends up so much more that originally thought. This is a movie about taking everything to a higher pitch. It's about the artist and the dilettante. It's about the movies being a purely commercial enterprise. Wallace Beery is the king of the screen. It's a wrestling movie. For God's sake, they're asking for so little. Barton Fink is a whiny loser and he pays the price. The Coens are, without a doubt, the most refreshing thing of the last two decades.

It's 1941. Barton Fink (John Turturro)'s Broadway play 'Bare Ruined Choirs' is a great critical success. His agent gets him hired as a writer for Capitol Pictures in Hollywood. He hopes for something more profound and the money could help. He checks into the ocean-side Hotel Earle. Chet (Steve Buscemi) is the hotel clerk. Studio boss Jack Lipnick (Michael Lerner) is exceedingly excited. He tries to write but he's distracted by the noise coming from next door. He complains and boisterous salesman Charlie Meadows (John Goodman) brings over a drink. He struggles to write and gets distracted.

The Coen brothers always march to their own drums. Sometimes I love them. Sometimes I'm perplexed by them. Always, I'm fascinated by them. The stuff at the studio meanders and I struggle to hold on to the various characters. On the other hand, I love the surrealism of the hotel. I would have love the movie more by staying at the hotel after meeting Lipnick. John Goodman is amazing. It's a great demented buddy relationship.

This movie is a great example of a film with Multiple Personality Disorder. It started off GREAT with excellent writing and acting and sets. I was really hooked! But, towards the end, it just looked like the Coens got tired of reading or writing the script and filmed whatever came into their heads (after, perhaps, ingesting some LSD). It went from a very perceptive film about how the Hollywood establishment often destroys the creative process to a psycho killer movie in the space of just minutes. I mean, WHAT was the reasoning and motivation to create the character John Goodman portrayed??!! Huh?!!?! It made me irritated to see such an excellent film flushed down the drain so quickly.

My feelings about the Coen brothers' films varies tremendously. For example, I hated this film and wasn't particularly impressed with Fargo (it was too normal) BUT I think that The Hudsicker Proxy and Brother, Where Art Thou? are two of the finest movies in recent memory. Try to give us the weirdness of these last two movies while exercising a little more restraint, please.