Watch: One Person, One Frame: The Coen Brothers’ Embrace of Human Imperfection

The compassion of the Coen Brothers cannot be ignored. It shows up everywhere: in their storylines, which demonstrate repeatedly how difficult it is to simply live, carry on a life, without someone barging into your home and tossing a ferret in the bathtub with you; in their production design, which glorifies kitsch on the one hand and valorizes the clarity of a green desk lamp (as in ‘Miller’s Crossing’); and in their cinematography, which, as Tony Zhou demonstrates in his latest brilliant technique-obsessed video essay, allows us to become intimately familiar with the faces and souls of characters by simply letting them occupy an entire frame by themselves.