Introduction
Hitchcock, Kubrick, Scorsese, PTA, and The Coen Brothers. Names synonymous with not just filmmaking, but GREAT filmmaking. Joel Daniel and Ethan Jesse Coen, for over four decades the ‘brothers’ have been consistently delivering to the public, films that are inventive, hilarious, shocking, brutal, and masterful. Starting with Blood Simple in 1984 their portfolio of work has garnered an astonishing forty-two Oscar nominations, winning six (two for Fargo in 1996 and four for No Country for Old Men in 2007).
Time Apart
After writing and directing eighteen films together over a thirty-five-year stretch, the brothers decided to work on their projects, independent of each other. Their last collaboration together was The Ballad of Buster Scruggs in 2018. In 2021 Joel wrote, directed, and produced The Tragedy of Macbeth, based on Shakespeare’s play and starring his wife, Frances McDormand, and Denzel Washington. In 2022, Ethan directed Jerry Lee Lewis: Trouble in Mind, a documentary on singer/songwriter Jerry Lee Lewis. He followed that up with Drive Away Dolls in 2024, which he directed and co-wrote with his wife Tricia Cooke.
After seven years, Joel and Ethan Coen are slated to once again write and direct a feature film. After finishing up production on his latest solo project, Honey Don’t (starring Margaret Qualley and Chris Evans), Ethan will once again rejoin Joel for writing and directing duties. Ethan spoke to the Associated Press in 2024 about not working with his brother:
“…It wasn’t breaking up. It was just me going, ‘Uaaagghh’…It was great. It’s always great. But it’s not like we were out of contact. We see each other all the time, talk all the time…when people say ‘I was burned out,’ I always roll my eyes…It was always fun working with Joel, doing those movies. They were a gas…”
What’s Next?
Of course, after a multi-year layoff, when two of the greatest filmmakers of the last half-century get back together, it’s news. So, in January of this year, when Ethan, promoting Drive Away Dolls at a Q&A in Norway, announced that the brothers had written a new script, Hollywood took notice. Of particular interest is that the genre this time around is horror and in the same vein as their debut film, Blood Simple. Ethan stated:
“…It’s a pure horror film, and it gets very bloody…If you like Blood Simple, I think you’ll enjoy it…”
Ethan also spoke to The Wrap in February of this year promising lots of fake blood and…feathers? Blood, feathers, and the Coen Brothers. If that’s not a mix made in heaven, I don’t know what is. With the script finished, principal photography is scheduled to commence in the fall. As soon as we have more information on the Coen Brothers’ new film, you’ll be the first to know!
