The Coen Brothers' recent output has been, for the most part, dealing with serious issues in a slightly unserious manner. 2008's Burn After Reading poked fun at the world of international espionage, Inside Lleweyn Davis looked at the idea of creative lethargy in the face of constant rejection whilst True Grit livened up the humour in Charles Portis' novel with a stellar performance by Jeff Bridges. Hail, Caesar! is an entirely different beast to Burn After Reading or, indeed, any of their most recent work. It's closer to Barton Fink or O, Brother Where Art Thou, but only just so.
Josh Brolin is Eddie Mannix, a production executive for Capitol Pictures (interestingly, the same studio Barton Fink worked for) who is caught in a bind over the course of a single day. Although his job is highly stressful and forces him to work out of hours and is always on the go, he's been offered a much more lucrative role with a "serious" business. While he's deciding on what to do, one of his studio's main stars (George Clooney) is kidnapped by a mysterious group who demand a ransom from the studio. Parallel to this, he has to work out the various kinks in films in production, such as Ralph Fiennes' coaching a hapless Western star, Alden Ehrenreich, through a single scene in a tuxedo drama. Scarlett Johansson is in there, briefly, with a subplot about a child that, in pure Coen fashion, works completely on its own and wraps itself without a single nod to the rest of the story.
Brolin is pitch-perfect as the square-jawed fixer, rattling off the '50s dialogue like a Tommy Gun and giving himself over to all its quirkiness. Alden Ehrenreich is adorable as the simple-but-lovable cowboy who's just trying his best. Paired with the thespian director of Ralph Fiennes, there's an extended scene involving a single line that is the highlight of the film - and serves no purpose other than to have a chuckle at it all. Tilda Swinton, meanwhile, storms through her scenes as twin gossip columnists Thora and Thessaly Thacker with all the clipped, twitchy energy we'd expect from her. George Clooney, meanwhile, is back to his usual comedic styles and offers a sly look at the vacuity in actors and their repetition of just about they hear. Ralph Fiennes plays the role of serious, considered thespian / auteur to a tee, lampooning both himself, Olivier, and any other actor-director with a British accent who worked in Hollywood in the '50s.
For all its star-power, Hail, Caesar! is as much as about them as it is about the writing. The Coens have crafted one of their smartest and funniest scripts in years and there's a real sense that they're trying to communicate an idea with the audience; that just because a film is frivolous or lighthearted doesn't mean it's any less worthy of effort of something more serious. The same goes even for film itself, that because it's make-believe doesn't mean it should be dismissed. The action flicks sharply and easily between screwball comedy to more heady stuff, like Brolin trying to convince a group of religious leaders that his film - a pastiche of Ben-Hur - isn't offensive to any one particular group. Roger Deakins' cinematography works wonderfully with the golden-tinged production design as does the slinky jazz score and over-the-top, Miklos Rozsa-inspired dramatic cues.
Overall, Hail, Caesar! is a well-crafted, slyly intelligent comedy by two masters of the genre. Easily the funniest film they've made in years.