- Barton Fink is an impressive achievement in that it critically examines, and accidentally suffers from, the enormous chasm that separates an artist's lofty ideals and the practical obligation to entertain "the common man." The eponymous artist, Barton Fink (John Turturro), is a New York playwright who resembles Harold Lloyd without the goofy grin. Whereas Lloyd's comedy brimmed with a certain carefree optimism, however, Fink is a dark, obsessive type who constantly initiates painfully academic discussions of how art should reflect and improve social conditions. Thus, you can imagine Fink's surprise when his first Hollywood writing gig, ordered from on high by the excessive studio head Jack Lipnick (Michael Lerner), is a "Wallace Beery wrestling picture." And so Fink's bout of writer's block begins.
- The film's most brilliant creation is surely Fink's hotel, which, despite its creepy, cavernous appearance and apparent vacancy, features a room that has every problem every renter has ever encountered. Peeling wallpaper, creaky bedsprings, mosquitoes, and loud neighbors abound, further complicating Fink's struggles at the typewriter. His most interesting neighbor is certainly an insurance salesman named Charlie Meadows (John Goodman), exactly the type of commoner Fink loves writing and talking about. Charlie is an affable mountain of a man who freely shares liquor and wrestling demonstrations alike with the increasingly distraught Fink. In fact, Charlie comes across as a much better friend to the writer than any of Fink's work colleagues, including the rude, fast-talking producer, Ben Geisler (Tony Shalhoub), and the distinctly Faulknerian writer, W.P. Mayhew (John Mahoney). Mayhew is a particularly difficult case because his heavy drinking quickly sends him flying off the rails, usually into a torrent of abuse directed as his assistant and lover, Audrey Taylor (Judy Davis).
- But here is where the narrative takes a bit of a turn. Whether Fink is meant to be slowly losing his mind or whether the Coen Brothers share in Mayhew's love for "makin' stuff up," I don't know. The bottom line is that Fink sleeps with Miss Taylor and subsequently wakes up next to her bloody corpse without remembering what has happened. His scream alerts Charlie, who quickly disposes of the body, but it isn't long before Fink is getting grilled by some corny L.A. detectives (Richard Portnow and Christopher Murney). Soon the hotel is on fire and Charlie is a serial killer with Nazi sympathies. So what's in the box that Charlie gave Fink? Nobody knows. What's the girl from the poster on Fink's wall doing at that beach from Planet of the Apes? Nobody knows. Why should you watch the film's final third? I don't know. Maybe the Coen Brothers actually meant for Barton Fink to serve as a meta-exploration of abstruse storytelling. The arbitrary plot twists and character developments that recall Mr. Lipnick's lack of a preference between a "dame" and an "orphan" in his stories were surely intentional, at least. Whatever their point was supposed to have been, the Coens managed to produce an ending that should have disappointed artists and common men alike. As much as I enjoyed the first two-thirds of the film, the only character I related to by the end was the corpse.
- This film won the Palme d'Or, Best Actor, and Best Director at Cannes. It was the first and very likely the last film to do so as they later passed a rule limiting the number of awards to two.
- Everybody agrees that Fink was based on Clifford Odets.
- "Wallace Beery. Wrestling picture. What do you need, a roadmap?"
- The film also features Jon Polito at his most restrained and Steve Buscemi.
