In a moving and involving piece of writing, Salon’s Andrew O’Hehir talks to the Coens about A Serious Man, but also talks at length about the film:
One thing is for sure: This story, which comes to us in the form of a movie called “A Serious Man,” is one of the subtlest, darkest and most deceptive ever spun by Joel and Ethan Coen, its writers, directors and producers. This is by far the most personal and revealing film the Coens have ever made, which might not seem like saying much: They’re known for creating mannered, sardonic fictional worlds shaped as much (or more) by film history as by real life. But in recapturing the vanished realm where they grew up — a self-enclosed world of Midwestern Jewish suburbia — the Coens have crafted perhaps their most original work, one that presents¬†itself, early on,¬†as middleweight middle-American domestic comedy before revealing a¬†strange and secret power that’s closer to magic or myth.
The truth is the film writing is more interesting than the interview. You know those Coens, like the Bob Dylan of film directors – they always have on their poker face.