The planets must not be properly aligned.

I went to see the new Coen bros. movie, The Ladykillers (a remake of a 1955 British black comedy starring Alec Guinness–which I haven’t seen) , without the thought even crossing my mind that it might possibly be sold out. It was. (Glad I got there a little early!) What I suppose I failed to take into account is that it’s also the new Tom Hanks movie, which obviously means a great deal more from a box-office standpoint.

Personally, I’ve never been much of a Hanks fan. I dislike Philapdelphia, despise Forrest Gump, and infinitely prefer Malick’s The Thin Red Line to Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan. On the other hand, I’ve always dug the Coens’ work. Barton Fink’s my personal favorite, but there isn’t a film in their ouevre that I haven’t at least gotten an aesthetic kick out of.

The Ladykillers is no exception, but it’d run neck-in-neck with The Hudsucker Proxy as my least-favorite Coens’ movie. More surprisingly, though, I LOVED (not liked, not appreciated–LOVED!) Hanks’ performance as an Edgar Allan Poe-reciting Southern “professor”/criminal mastermind. It’s far and away the most interesting performance Hanks has ever given. He’s hilariously droll, charming in that distinctly Southern sort of way, despite his oddball mannerisms, and so much fun to watch every minute he’s on screen.

The rest of the movie is less remarkable. I don’t want to go so far as to say it’s phoned-in, but The Ladykillers is clearly a slight Coens’ effort. One violent sight gag, for instance, is ripped straight from their last movie, Intolerable Cruelty, a much finer and funnier film that used the gag much more effectively. If that’s not laziness, then I don’t know what is! Still, even a lesser Coen comedy is vastly preferable to most of what’s playing at the ‘plexes right now, and, to give credit where it’s due, The Ladykillers, while one of the Coens’ most decidedly mainstream offerings, nonetheless possesses their singularly bizarre sensibility, plus lush-as-always Roger Deakins cinematography. It’s a bit of a mess and ultimately less than the sum its parts, but, hey, it’s a hell of a lot more fun than The Passion of the Christ.