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Thread: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

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    The Amateur Mandolinist Mark Gunter's Avatar
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    Default The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    The Ballad of Buster Scruggs and other tales of the old west ...

    I watched it this weekend, and about to watch it again. Coen Brothers movies aren't for everyone, granted. I really enjoyed this film. Tim Blake Nelson (who played Delmar in O Brother Where Art Thou) stars in the first vignette as Buster Scruggs. It's a cool musical western farce. I really dig the musical numbers, he kicks it off with Cool Clear Water.

    All six vignettes are not musical, but the last one has a cool, abbreviated a capella rendition of The Trooper Cut Down In His Prime, performed by Irishman Brendan Gleeson. That song (in its many forms) is the "original" that morphed into songs like St. James Hospital and Streets of Laredo.

    All in all, a cool film for folk who like Coen Brothers stuff.
    Last edited by Mark Gunter; Nov-20-2018 at 11:42pm. Reason: Spelling
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    Mando-Accumulator Jim Garber's Avatar
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    I am a big fan of the Coen Brothers (note spelling without the "h"). I plan to watch The Ballad of Buster Scruggs soon.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Ha, thanks for catching my spelling gaff, Jim.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    I noticed Randall Collins playing in the saloon in the first act.

    I like the idea of short stories on the streaming platform of today. I think it could be done better than the Coen bros. But i really hope others carry it on and expand on it
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    From Mark Gunter - " Tim Blake Nelson (who played Delmar in O Brother Where Art Thou) ". ''Oh Brother...." was a superb film & Tim Blake Nelson was awesome " - '' We thought you was a Toad '' !!. He's a heck of a good straight actor as well.

    I've seen the 'Buster Scruggs' film mentioned over here - i'll look out for it,
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    Registered User Cary Fagan's Avatar
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    A friend and I have been going to Coen brothers films for fifteen or twenty years and we're going to see Buster in a theatre tonight. Their films always look great on the big screen.

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    I watched it yesterday, two hours very well spent!
    Good for any Western fan! I don’t know if it was Brendan Gleesons actual voice of course but, the song always brings tears to my eyes! I have asked a friend to sing it at my funeral!
    It will be a good post turkey coma film! I might have to watch it between today’s projects! Gravy making, stuffing prep, brining of the turkey etc, etc.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    I loved that movie. Going to see it again, soon. So macabre, so funny, so sad.

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Well I thought it sucked and was a complete waste of time. If I wish to be fatalistic all I have to do is watch the news. They went from making a wonderful masterpiece of O' Brother to complete nihilistic and fatalistic drivel. But then, I've always been an outlier.

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Quote Originally Posted by RustyMadd View Post
    Well I thought it sucked and was a complete waste of time. If I wish to be fatalistic all I have to do is watch the news. They went from making a wonderful masterpiece of O' Brother to complete nihilistic and fatalistic drivel. But then, I've always been an outlier.
    Not necessarily an outlier, RM, you may well be in the majority on that assessment. Would be a boring life if we all bore the same opinions. I've seen it twice now, and while I wouldn't consider it their best work, I found a lot of redeeming things about it, personally. Cinematography, dialog, music. And fatalism and nihilism have their place I suppose.

    Another of theirs that I always enjoyed was Inside Llewelyn Davis, a Coen Brothers take on the 60s Folk music scene. But many of the folkies I know who lived through that scene in the village cannot stand that movie, either. Loosely fashioned on Dave Van Ronk ... and his widow despises the film.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    "Can't no one compel another man to engage in recreation - certainly not a son-of-a-gun as ill-humored as yourself ..."

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Well, sorry that you have such little affinity for the film, as for “Oh, Brother...” when one begins with an opus from the hand of Homer, one should expect a good story.
    The vignettes of the short stories of the West are a completely different animal, Barton Fink was not a genius piece of work from the Coen brothers in my opinion but, I don’t need to rant about it.
    But, we are all entitled to our opinions.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Quote Originally Posted by RustyMadd View Post
    Well I thought it sucked and was a complete waste of time. If I wish to be fatalistic all I have to do is watch the news. They went from making a wonderful masterpiece of O' Brother to complete nihilistic and fatalistic drivel. But then, I've always been an outlier.
    I haven't seen Ballad of Buster Scruggs, but is it really darker than Fargo?

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    I really enjoyed Tom Waits as the prospector

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Quote Originally Posted by hattio View Post
    I haven't seen Ballad of Buster Scruggs, but is it really darker than Fargo?
    You'll have to see it; no spoilers here hopefully

    Quote Originally Posted by Timbofood View Post
    ... as for “Oh, Brother...” when one begins with an opus from the hand of Homer, one should expect a good story...
    An excellent point! As an aside, I read somewhere that Tim Blake Nelson was the only member of the entire "O Brother ..." cast who had read and was schooled in Homer's Odyssey. He's one well educated, well-spoken and highly talented dude, IMO. I also think it says something about the appreciation of classical literature on the part of some famous thespians that none of the others had ever read Homer.

    I just read a bit more about O Brother ... and it seems that no one on the entire set had read Odyssey, including the Coens, except Tim B. Nelson. Just seems odd to me because as a young man I ordered Classics Club books and read Homer, Cicero, Plato, etc. etc. Sometimes I forget how weird I am.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Quote Originally Posted by hattio View Post
    I haven't seen Ballad of Buster Scruggs, but is it really darker than Fargo?
    I wouldn’t say “Darker” but, it’s certainly shady.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    I liked some parts, but not all.
    I thought the first one was pretty funny, especially making the guy in the bar shoot himself.
    The Coen Bros films are always a bit odd, but I like that.

    The Coens cast my father-in-law in No Country For Old Men.
    He played the gas station attendant in the “coin flip” scene.
    I thought that was very cool.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Just watched. I can say that it left an impression. Definitely. But of just what I am still trying to figure out. Could be that is what I like about it.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Wow, that was a very scary scene, and as with much of the Coen’s stuff, after I watch it I’m left wondering how the heck they pulled it off.

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Loved the music in Buster Scruggs, especially when the whole saloon broke into a rousing, dancing gunfighter ballad about the shooting that had just happened. Wickedly funny lyrics.

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Quote Originally Posted by RustyMadd View Post
    Well I thought it sucked and was a complete waste of time. If I wish to be fatalistic all I have to do is watch the news. They went from making a wonderful masterpiece of O' Brother to complete nihilistic and fatalistic drivel. But then, I've always been an outlier.
    It reminded me of Edgar Allen Poe short stories written in a Western genre. Since I watched the whole thing there must have been something entertaining about it. But, I can't honestly say what it was that was entertaining. Maybe I was just holding out hoping it would get better.

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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Nevermind, I liked it, I liked the one man show of Edgar Allen Poe too I was lucky enough to see John Astin to at a tiny high school auditorium too. Intimate format was great.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Coens are always an acquired taste. "The Meal Ticket" was horrible on one hand and a brilliantly Grimm-like fairy tale on the other and told completely without any dialog, just the repeated monologue of the performer.
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    Quote Originally Posted by CWRoyds View Post
    I liked some parts, but not all.
    I thought the first one was pretty funny, especially making the guy in the bar shoot himself.
    The Coen Bros films are always a bit odd, but I like that.

    The Coens cast my father-in-law in No Country For Old Men.
    He played the gas station attendant in the “coin flip” scene.
    I thought that was very cool.
    wow that was a pretty big part, because i remember exactly who youre talking about
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    Default Re: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix

    TBN likes him some music;
    He is a self-described Steve Earle "completest", and said he would have been ready to die after getting to sing Jimmy Rodgers' "In The Jailhouse Now" in OBWAT.
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