YMMV / Barton Fink

• Accidental Aesop:
  • While passion for your work is a good thing, sometimes you have to accept Executive Meddling as a necessary evil for advancement. Barton trying to be a passionate artist ends up torpedoing his relationship with Lipnick. Had he followed Lipnick's orders, Barton would've been in a better position professionally and financially.
  • Don't ever trust a total stranger, no matter how friendly they may act. Barton letting Charlie into his life without scrutiny caused him tremendous personal agony.
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Was Charlie's friendly, endearing persona all just an act to hide murderous intentions all along, or is Charlie, in his own twisted way, a genuinely friendly man until his Berserk Button is pushed and "Madman Mundt" is unleashed? In other words, is he Affably Evil or Faux Affably Evil?
  • Is Lipnick going to permanently torpedo Fink's career? Or will he eventually give Fink another chance if he shapes up and learns to follow orders? Is that what he means by "growing up a little".
• Award Snub: Similar to most of The Coen Brothers' films before Fargo, this was relatively ignored come the Academy Awards (outside of a few warranted nominations for technical categories like Art Direction along with Best Supporting Actor for Michael Lerner as Jack Lipnick). In particular, John Turturro's and John Goodman's performances deserved far more consideration (though Goodman at least scored a Golden Globe nod).
• Diagnosed by the Audience: To say Charlie has some kind of mental disorder is putting it mildly. His willingness to murder over getting a noise complaint shows he lacks impulse control. This is on top of superficial charm and manipulative tendencies.
• Draco in Leather Pants: Charlie is just so damn charming and likable, many people side with him even when he's committed multiple homicides.
• Everyone Is Jesus in Purgatory: The further you get into the movie, the less you can believe it is meant to be taken literally.
• Heartwarming Moments: Much of Barton and Charlie's dialog just makes you feel fuzzy. It all goes down the drain after The Reveal, however.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Scenes with Barton and producer Ben Geisler are funnier once you realize it is an interaction between Adrian and Ambrose Monk years before that show even was produced.
  • This film featured an ominous box and people asking what was inside it before Se7en became famous for it.
• Ho Yay:
  • Barton denies that his relationship with Charlie was some sort of sex thing, claiming that they just wrestled.
  • When they first meet, Charlie offers to buy Barton a drink. Some critics noted that the phrase sounds as a typical pick-up line.
• Jerkass Woobie: Barton. Sure, he's a smug, condescending jerk convinced of his intellectual and moral superiority, which is why he deserves the rough treatment he got at the hands of Lipnick and the studio at the end of the movie. But nothing he did was so terrible as to justify the hell Charlie put him through.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • You commit some incredibly minor offense against someone, such as a noise complaint. By an unfortunate coincidence, this individual turns out to be a complete psychopath who proceeds to methodically murder everyone you know in revenge while simultaneously posing as your friend.
  • While we're at it, imagine witnessing the person next to you getting shotgunned by said psychopath, who has lit the hallway you're in on fire and begins charging at you, screaming at the top of his lungs, all without flinching at the fire trail following him before leaving you defenseless as he holds the shotgun right to your face.
• Strawman Has a Point: Jack Lipnick at the end. He rejects Barton Fink's screenplay and places him under a contract that will not produce anything he writes until he learns to fall in line. On the other hand, Barton was SUPPOSED to write a screenplay for a wrestling picture, not an angsty drama.

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