In the brightly lit world of big cinema, the Coen brothers are an enigma. They have created their own unique genre with their highly idiosyncratic films, building a cinematic universe with its own morals and rules. This universe bears an unsettling resemblance to America, yet it is not America. This world can only be described as Coenesque. This documentary explores the careers of Joel and Ethan Coen, attempting to answer the question that so many have asked: how do they do it?
Their chameleon-like talent has reinvented every genre, including thrillers, comedies, tragedies, westerns and musicals, and made it their own. The documentary reveals how their shared childhood fantasies and their sense of alienation from American life gave rise to this unique vision. It also reveals how they were influenced by the golden age of Hollywood and created a new golden age of independent cinema themselves. In doing so, they retained their eccentric personalities, establishing them as two of the most unlikely creative minds ever to conquer Hollywood.
The documentary follows the strange but brilliant journey that led the brothers there. It is a fascinating story about the collaboration of two people who sometimes seem like one person. It is a story as darkly comical as each of their films.