Films of the 00s: O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Well, some things never change, and I guess the conversation-killing power of Up at the Villa is one of those things. I didn't pick this as my next post on purpose to attract more comments, but I suspect you all will have more to say. O brothers and sisters and everyone in between, what think thou?:

"The Coens are not always as smart as they pretend to be, even when they admit that they are pretending, and even when they use their own dramatis personae to set an ostentatiously low bar for their own comparative wit and urbanity. Normally, I'd be only too happy to snuggle up to a movie with lines of dialogue like 'She's at the 5 & Dime, buying nickels' or, with great consternation, 'These boys desecrated a fiery cross!' But the Coens are like party acquaintances who keep changing the subject and then staring at you quizzically when you can't follow the thread, or when you stop wanting to follow it, but who then block all your exit routes from their obnoxious conversation. They make it damned hard to pan one of their technically prepossessing, unimpeachably distinctive films without collapsing into standby allegations about their coldness and their cruelty." (keep reading...)

I've done more '00 viewing in the mornings before work than I'm letting on in the sidebar. Possible future topics of conversation: hijacked buses, split screens, Iranian smugglers, Staten Island, Pikey boxers, African feminism, dead whales at midnight, gays of the past, and gays out West. What sounds good?

Earlier in this series: Up at the Villa, Bamboozled (with Tim), Mission to Mars, The Beach (with Tim), Dôlè, La Captive, American Psycho, and Wonder Boys