Inside Llewyn Davis is a great slow character music drama. It has fantastic performances, excellent music and terrific cinematography.
Inside Llewyn Davis follows Llewyn Davis (Oscar Issac), who is a down on his luck folk song singer in New York City in 1961. He is not very successful, but occasionally plays at the Gaslight Cafe. Inside Llewyn Davis is about several days in his life. This includes his interactions with Jean (Carey Mulligan), and her husband Jim (Justin Timberlake), and his attempts to be successful in NYC and Chicago. This may sound vague, but the plot is not the main element of Inside Llewyn Davis.
The characters and music are the main elements. The plot is very loose, with not much structure and no big events. Inside just follows Davis through his life and the events that occur. It is a very lenient plot but that works, even though it is a slow paced movie at times. The character of Llewyn Davis is an interesting and well written character that makes for a good lead to follow. The writing is not the only reason the character works.
The other reason is the actor potraying him. Oscar Issac is fantastic in the lead role of Llewyn Davis. Even though the character is a not a likeable one at times, Issac still makes him feel sympathetic and likeable. Issac’s singing is also fantastic. He sounds great, like a real folk singer. He really helps to make the music side work.
The music side is great. Unlike other movies, the songs are sung in full by the actors. The direction is also done so that shots range from their faces and expressions. While there are also shots of the locations that are being played in, that show off the impressive production design. Unlike the other aspects of the movie, it was given a well deserved Oscar nom. While the rest of the movie was snubbed.
The impressive production design is also shown off by the teriffic cinematography. There are great shots ranging from landscape shots showing off the locations, to shots of the actors just talking, which works due to the acting on display.
The rest of the actors are also fantastic besides Issac. Mulligan is biting and darkly comic as Jean. Timberlake is good as Jim, especially in one very fun secne set at a recording studio with a song that Jim wrote. Goodman and Hedlund are also strong in their small roles. Overall Inside Llewyn Davis is a fantastic, well acted character drama with an excellent use of music and terrific cinematography.
Inside Llewyn Davis is rated R for language including some sexual references. I give Inside Llewyn Davis an insider A-
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