If you make a living at it, more power to you.
At this point, three decades and 16 films in their career, Joel and Ethan Coen could write and direct a film on just about any subject and I would turn out for it. Their latest, Inside Llewyn Davis, is set in 1961 in the Greenwich Village folk music scene, which the title character is attempting to find his place in without much success. Once part of a duo, Llewyn (Oscar Isaac) is making little headway as a solo artist and spends his time bouncing from couch to couch, imposing himself on anybody who will put up with him for a day or two and scrounging up the occasional gig. As the film makes abundantly clear, though, he's rapidly running out of options.
A prickly personality even under the best of circumstances, Llewyn's woes are amplified when the female half of folk duo Jean and Jim (Carey Mulligan and Justin Timberlake) reveals she's pregnant, forcing him to scramble to get the money to pay for an abortion. (Ironically enough, it's Jim who comes through for him, bringing Llewyn in on a recording session for a topical novelty tune called "Please Mr. Kennedy" which had damn well better get nominated for Best Original Song if the Academy knows what's good for it.) With that obligation taken care of, he lights out for Chicago with a haughty jazz musician (John Goodman), a taciturn beat poet (Garrett Hedlund), and an orange tabby that he picked up along the way and can't seem to get rid of. When he reaches his destination, though, the promoter he auditions for (F. Murray Abraham) is less than impressed ("I don't see a lot of money here" are his exact words) and it's back to New York City for our thoroughly discouraged hero.
In spite of the fact that it was shunted off to one of the smaller screening rooms at the theater where I saw it, the film still managed to draw a near-capacity crowd. (With all of the choices out there this holiday season, that is no small thing.) I'd like to think this bodes well for its continued success as it opens wider in the new year. The more people who see Inside Llewyn Davis, the better off he'll be.