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A Broadway playwright with writer's block is lured to Hollywood and plunged into a surreal nightmare.
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Barton Fink (John Turturro) is a Broadway playwright lured to Hollywood with the promise of untold riches by a boorish studio chieftain. Despising the film capital and everything it stands for, Fink comes down with an acute case of writer's block. He is looked after by a secretary who has been acting as a ghost writer for an alcoholic screenwriter. Also keeping tabs on Fink is a garrulous traveling salesman, the most likeable, stable character in the picture. Then comes the plot twist to end all plot twists, which plunges Barton Fink into a surreal nightmare.
"Just the fourth feature film from filmmakers Ethan and Joel Coen (known as the Coen Brothers), 'Barton Fink' put them at the top of the 1991 Cannes Film Festival, where it was recognized not only with the Palme d'Or, but also with the awards for best director and best actor (John Turturro). It's a jarring mix of disturbing psychological suspense and black comedy style that would eventually become the Coen Brothers' trademark, but it's also one of their most complex films. With influences ranging from Luis Buñuel to David Lynch and Roman Polanski ('The Tenant'), 'Barton Fink' unfolds like a feverish nightmare that comments on the creative process (and its frequent frustrations), the supposed distinction between high culture and popular culture, the gap between intellectuals and "common men" and the rise of fascism before World War II. A filmic cocktail that allows for multiple readings on each new occasion, masterfully performed by Turturro and John Goodman ('The Big Lebowski')."