The Hudsucker Proxy

Directed by Joel Coen, The Hudsucker Proxy follows 1950s college graduate Norville Barnes (Tim Robbins) as he arrives in New York City and is quickly made president of a large corporation – with Norville’s ascension due entirely to the company’s interests in seeing their stock plunge after its founder’s death. Filmmaker Coen, armed with a script written alongside Ethan Coen and Sam Raimi, delivers a briskly-paced, incredibly stylish piece of work that fares best in its compelling and periodically enthralling first half, as the movie has been suffused with a whole host of striking attributes that cumulatively capture (and sustain) the viewer’s interest – with, especially, Roger Deakins’ spellbinding visuals and Dennis Gassner’s eye-popping production design going a long way towards heightening the picture’s initial impact and success. (It’s clear, too, that the picture benefits from its raft of above-average performances, with Robbins’ first-class turn as the affable protagonist certainly matched by such eclectic periphery players as Bill Cobbs, Bruce Campbell, and Paul Newman.) And while the picture remains quite watchable throughout, and quite unexpectedly funny, too (eg the quick flashback into the double-stitching of Newman’s pants), The Hudsucker Proxy‘s overlong running time admittedly does result in a handful of lulls within its far-from-streamlined final third – with the fantastical climax perhaps not quite as captivating as Coen has intended. This hardly changes the fact that The Hudsucker Proxy is, for the most part, a fun, entertaining throwback that’s rife with appealing and memorable elements, and it is, in the final analysis, not a stretch to label the picture one of the Coen brothers’ more successful endeavors.

*** out of ****