This twenty-fifth anniversary rerelease is a welcome chance to enjoy the Coen Brothers’ typically idiosyncratic take on Homer’s Odyssey (also the basis for Christopher Nolan’s next film) on the big screen. George Clooney stars as Ulysses Everett McGill, who leads fellow chain gang convicts Pete (John Turturro) and Delmar (Tim Blake Nelson) to escape their confines on a search for literal buried treasure. Along the way, the trio encounter cyclops and sirens, as well as Coen regulars including John Goodman and Holly Hunter, and fall in with young musician Tommy Johnson (Chris Thomas King), with whom they record a song that, unbeknownst to them, becomes a major hit. Eventually, Everett’s true reasons for escaping also come to light. For all of its classical allusions, O Brother, Where Art Thou? is the Coen Brothers at their loosest and most purely entertaining.

Notes by Kevin Coyne.