From the opening shots, as the camera glides over a scale model of New York City, Proxy<\/em> announces itself as a very deliberate construction. Set in the final month of 1958, it\u2019s a world of tall buildings, long tables, and conspicuous circles, beginning with the clock face at the top of Hudsucker Industries. The plot too has a circular structure \u2013 we meet hero Norville Barnes (played with affable gooniness by Tim Robbins) on New Years Eve as he climbs onto the building ledge and prepares to fall down its forty four stories (not counting the mezzanine.) How he got there and why is what most of the film concerns itself with, but unlike many of the 1950s classics that served as inspiration, it\u2019s not easy to summarize. Perhaps it\u2019ll suffice to say that he\u2019s the titular proxy, brought up from the mailroom on his first day by Sidney J. Mussburger (a superbly officious Paul Newman) to run the company into the ground after the president takes his own leap from the top office. But Norville has some ideas he\u2019s eager to share, and things don\u2019t go according to plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For hungry cinephiles, Proxy<\/em> is a veritable smorgasbord of references. While the frenetic dialogue mimics the rat-a-tat pacing of films like Sweet Smell of Success<\/em> and His Girl Friday<\/em> \u2013 especially once Jennifer Jason Leigh enters the picture as undercover journalist Amy Archer \u2013 the precise production design recalls everything from Fritz Lang\u2019s Metropolis<\/em> to Terry Gilliam\u2019s Brazil<\/em>. Cinematographer Roger Deakins shot many of the effects practically, giving them a ramshackle vaudevillian energy. And it\u2019s all told at the same breakneck Looney Tunes speed of Raising Arizona<\/em>. To quote a Coen film mentioned earlier in this piece: \u201cWhaddya need, a roadmap?\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n Turns out both audiences and critics did. Or at least they wanted some kind of explanation. True to form, the Coens were almost perversely hostile to giving any. Asked if the film could be read as a representation of capitalism vs. labor, Joel replied, \u201cMaybe the characters do embody those grand themes you mentioned, but that question is independent of whether or not we’re interested in them \u2013 and we’re not.\u201d Such brusque denial seems a bit disingenuous since they\u2019ve always had an interest in working class stories, but regardless, it did little to endear their oddball satire to viewers looking to get onto its wavelength. \u201cAll surface and no substance,\u201d as Roger Ebert put it in his two-star review<\/a>, was a typical sentiment. John Simon went further, calling it \u201casinine and insufferable\u201d in a piece published in his compendium, John Simon on Film<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Leigh\u2019s performance often bore the brunt of these complaints about artificiality. Like the film itself, her work is basically a quotation, built on mannerisms borrowed from Rosalind Russell, Katherine Hepburn, and Barbara Stanwyck, particularly in The Lady Eve<\/em>, and dialed up to eleven. She\u2019s always been one of our most dedicated actresses, and one of the most ahead of her time in the risks she\u2019s willing to take, which may be why some critics chafed against both the vulnerability and unique modernity she brings to Amy. While male actors of the method school are often praised for their immersion in a role, there\u2019s an undeniable misogynistic strain to the reaction Leigh\u2019s \u201cstudied\u201d performance drew, as if she was little more than an overeager pupil.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Time has been kind, though, both to Leigh and to The Hudsucker Proxy<\/em>. While it only grossed about $3 million at the U.S. box office on a $25 million production budget, in an age when younger viewers are all about vibes and aesthetics, it\u2019s ripe for rediscovery. The debate over the Coens\u2019 sincerity continues to rage, but now that their collaborative career is apparently in the rearview, it\u2019s easier to see where Proxy<\/em> fits into their overall filmography. Their comedies always take longer to percolate with the public, and what might have seemed like a disappointing lark in 1994 feels at home alongside other pastiche-heavy works like O Brother, Where Art Thou<\/em> and Hail, Caesar<\/em>. Charges of the film being heartless ignore the genuine affection that went into crafting it. Neither a love letter nor a poison pen missive to the cinematic era it imitates, Proxy<\/em> strives to exist alongside it in its own right. Studios, however, might have been spooked by its losses and the Coens retreated to their grimier independent roots. But counting them out proved unwise: the next film they made was Fargo<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “The Hudsucker Proxy” is streaming on Kanopy<\/a> and is available for digital rental or purchase<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/hudsucker2.jpg\")
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