Another great little acting gem is him looking around his desk for something that doesn’t exist to somehow make his story more believable to a guy on the phone. Brilliant actually.
My Goodness! You are brilliant with your observation. He's doing as if he's trying to convince Riley Difenbach that he's looking for information that doesn't exist.
Reminds me of being back in elementary school when teacher came to collect our homework assignments and stupid me who didn't do the homework would pretend to search my bag for it while she stood over me with a stern look on her face as if she already knew I was looking for nothing and wasting her time.
Hey, your check bounced. That's fine, I already got the stuff from you that I got with the bad check. LMAO. I wonder if he used that line on the judge when he went to trial. "You see, your honor, this is all just a big misunderstanding. I already got the money so everything is OK. No fraud, just a misunderstanding. You see? Now, if you'll let me just be on my way".
That's the whole point. He's not bright but he's very delusional about everything. He really doesn't think he's doing anything bad but he is. It's like you lending someone money, you meet them, they are happy to see you but they are more worried about The Money. Then when it's time to pay back they hem, haw and stall not understanding why you are angry in the first place for not getting paid on a certain date.
Can u explain to me what exactly is the scam Jerry is trying to get away with in this scene ? I don’t get it ☹️. So he got 320000 for cars he made up. Why would he get money for cars that they own? Or does the money go to the costumers ? lol I’m so confused. Can you just tell me what’s going on here please ? 😁I just don’t get what Jerry is doing low key in this financing scene snippet.
Mariah Kemp he submitted a funding request for deals that don’t exist and kept the money. Now the bank needs to know which cars he borrowed against for their books.
Everything is perfect about this scene. The acting, the camera work, the storytelling, the direction. Yup. Tarantino threw down the gauntlet with Pulp Fiction (clearly inspired by the revolution in Noir and indie film that was the Coen Brother's "Blood Simple") and "Fargo" was their response, raising the ante (shooting it in winter no less, as if to say they were doing this with one hand tied behind their back). This is that rare thing...a perfect film
Because he's done scams in real life and knows how to act, did you not hear about their college kids scam, didnt his wife end up doing time? Its not acting, its real.
This scene is one of the best ever shot that immerses the viewer in the dread and anxiety of being caught in a complicated entanglement gone horribly wrong.
There is a reason the cinematographer shot Jerry in a separate management room, with clear glass and the blinds open, blinds that not so coincidentally resemble prison cell bars..
"I'll have my girl send you a copy then." Jerry's not just an incompetent fraudster, but also so insecure that he feels the need to pretend to have a personal secretary.
It isn't just that... he's deliberately adding a layer between himself and the guy on the phone, in an attempt to misdirect blame for any following screw-ups. Then he can say "I gotta get a new secretary!!"
@herakleitus I do wonder what led to him doing all this nonsense in the first place. Usually when you see characters (or real life people) resorting to stuff like this it's because they have seriously bad alcohol, drug, and/or gambling problems but none of those things seem to be an issue with Jerry. He's just a perpetual loser.
Even in my 30s, this scene always gives me painful, depressing flashbacks to all the times back in school when I didn't have some assignment done, knew I wouldn't be able to _get_ it done, and was giving like three separate sets of people the runaround about how far along with it I supposedly was. Miserable stuff.
@@user-jz3lk1oo5e Yes, I was guilty of the same thing too. It's only as an Adult do I realize not staying on top of Business can be very bad. did you ever see The Office (UK) David Brent didn't do a Payroll Deposit Sheet and the Heck he got over it.
Life is really so much better when you stay mostly on the straight and narrow. Sometimes I think about what it would be like to have things like this hanging over you - that any day, everything could fall in on you.
My dad was a compulsive liar and it rubbed off on me in my early 20s. Luckily I was able to shake that habit. Jerry reminds me of my dad quite a bit. Layers and layers of scams and lies.
@@breadfan262 No, that’s just salesman behavior. Most of the characters, including Jerry, do portray Minnesota nice, but that’s not what’s going on here.
I love the visual compositions the Coen brothers create in their movies. In this scene, they make it look like Jerry is behind bars. At the same time, by leaving little head space, they tell us that jerry is slowly being squeezed and approaching the inevitable end. Pure cinema.
For a film that is dark comedy, it is hilarious. To see william macy’s character’s continued downward spiral is a testament to his brilliant acting. We almost feel his angst and are left somewhat sympathetic, even though we are aware of the crime he’s committing. If I have to compare his situation, its somewhat like endlessly scooping water out of a leaking boat, in the middle of the ocean, with no land in site.
Macy has the best nervous, guilty laugh in this movie. When he's in the first interview with Marge and laughs and repeats "Babe the Blue Ox," she knows he's hiding something.
I really like how much later on we see him with a list of serial numbers and then he's purposely blunting the pencil and writing them down poorly specifically so that the fax would render them illegible
Every now and again you'll hear an actor say that they were so right for a part, and they'll share the lengths they went to to get it. Sometimes it rings true, sometimes not. In the case of Bill Macy and Jerry Lundegaard, well...he was perfect. Every moment on screen, perfect. You can almost hear him unravel.
I am amazed time and time again how all those really repetitive dialogues in this movie are not in the least annoying. They are rather a reflection of the characters denying reality.
Henry Fords 2nd genius move was to have his dealership pay for the cars when they left the factory. When the dealer whined, Ford told them”I am making you and your local banker rich, borrow the money from them”. Ford got paid up front and the bank was paid on their floor plan within 24-48 hours. GMAC will give this guy time but can yank that money back like he was getting a high colonic
It was 1987, GM corporate was a total mess. Departments were being merged, separated, remerged on a regular basis, computer systems were being changed, databases moved around, org charts constantly shifting, managers being reassigned and reassigned again, etc. The company was basically total chaos during that period, their thumbs were up their asses. This actually happened for real during that time period. A Pontiac-Buick-GMC dealer on Long Island took advantage of the internal mess at GM to defraud GMAC out of $6 billion by taking out loans against non-existant cars and submitting the paperwork with smudged/illegible VINs, knowing that GM wouldn't have the ability or inclination to check them properly. As an established dealership in good standing, who always paid his bills on time, they just automatically approved whatever he applied for with no further questions.
Whenever someone sent me something unreadable, be it by fax or super-low resolution image files, I always wished I could send them a condensed version of Lundegaard dealings with faked VIN-numbers.
Ha! Ha! That's a good one! Poor Riley Diefenbach, he's trying to tell Jerry over and over about The Serial Numbers not being legible but Jerry keeps hemming and hawing.
This is why he needed $750K from his father in law. To plug the hole that he caused by siphoning 320 grand out of the dealership with loans for cars that didn't exist. The movie never fully puts those two things together, but it's why a ten-percent finder's fee on the $750K wasn't going to be enough.
The first time my wife and I saw “A Serious Man” in the theater I immediately recognized the voice on the phone that Larry is arguing with as the same unseen actor who plays “Riley Diefenbach”.
I kind of like that we're not told. I always assumed he was just living beyond his means, trying to keep his wife in the bracket she would have grown up in (with her dad who is certainly much richer than Jerry). But I think we have enough information to know it was something stupid and mundane and as boring as his life was up until he came up with this ridiculous scheme.
This is why GMAC went out of business. My first property was a GMAC mortgage, and it got sold to another company when they filed for bankruptcy. Shame on you, Jerry.
there are a few theories....one is gambling debts....robbed Peter (GMAC) to pay Paul (the gambling-debt people) .....and felt safer putting off GMAC....until THIS scene...
Yep. This wasn't Riley's first rodeo. He knew what was going on. He was calling to document Jerry's responses. The next call would be to directly tell him it's going to security. Following all of the legal protocol.
Can you imagine being a CSR at a Bank and getting the same ol same ol excuse from a client who promises that he will pay a Bill and they don't. I remember reading a Book and one lady being a Smart Aleck who wrote a Check out but didn't put her signature on it to keep them nipping at her heels.
When it comes to Banks and responsibility, My Friend is a true "Diva". He doesn't understand he has to "pay" bills on time, IE Phone/TV/Internet, Bank Charge Fees, and he doesn't understand that when he takes Money from a Bank Machine that isn't from his Branch he gets "Charged" A Whopper of a Fee and he still takes the money out even though they will charge him. They took part of his Salary to pay his Back Taxes and he's shocked they would do such a thing. I love William H. Macy's Expression, the man is beyond scared and nervous.
I wish this clip actually showed the document he cooked up to make the VINs illegible. They did a great job making it realistic and impossible to read.
Jerry wanted the money from the kidnapping to fund the parking lot deal that he pitched to Wade, as if people wouldn't have asked where he came up with the huge down payment. Jerry felt like an emasculated loser because he was a working stiff and his father in law was very well off financially - remember when Wade told Jerry his wife and kid would never have to worry about money (i.e. I'll take care of them, but not you) when he talked about wanting to do the parking lot deal for them? The whole scheme was half baked - Jerry would likely have ended up in prison or dead even if the kidnapping and ransom payment had gone as planned.
Wes Thomas, yeah, that always bothered me - not knowing why Jerry needs the money so badly. I understand that it’s not vital to the plot AND that it’s intentionally left unknown, but it must be something awful if Jerry goes to these crazy lengths.
I bet Jerry needed the money because he was tax audited or was low on money due to spendthrift habits. Plus we can guess from the Truecoat scene that he probably doesn't do very well as a car salesman in general.
RobDog65 - well, not quite a "MacGuffin" like the PF brief case, or the falcon statue in Maltese Falcon. But an unknown act that precedes the action of the movie could be a sort of MacGuffin, too, I suppose. Side note: it looked to me like the Coen Bros. used almost the same exact banker's briefcase - but with twice as much money as the one in Fargo - in No Country for Old Men.
It might be a naive question: but why couldnt Jerry just send real car serial numbers from the dealership to the bank and then gain time to get the money and pay back the loan?
A guy really did this back in the 80s. And a woman in CT put her husbands corpse through a wood chipper. Most of the crimes in this movie really happened just the scenario changed.
What's funny is that Jerry has probably been stealing money from fake bank loans to make himself appear more successful to his family. Chances are he hasn't been selling many cars, with as horrible of a salesman as he is. This movie is very subtextually intricate.
Also to note in this scene, it's easy to miss in a first viewing that how we see Jerry doodling on the note pad on his desk when he is visibly nervous. He does that later in the film when Marge arrives to visit him to question him about a missing Cierra vehicle involved in three murders in her hometown. One can also see the reason why Jerry will go far to have his own wife kidnapped in the first place; some time prior to the start of this movie, Jerry applied for a $320,000 loan from the car dealership's banking loan company GMAC to finance a batch of vehicles sold at the dealership for collateral.... vehicles which clearly don't exist (which is why the VIN (serial numbers) on the loan application for the non-existent cars are smudged and intelligible). Jerry is clearly commiting finance fraud... and maybe embezzlement too which is a serious felony (which can get one sentenced to at least 15 years in a state prison). He clearly spent all of that money (speculating to provide for his family and their modest house that's seen in the film). So now, he's in a bind and needs to have his own wife kidnapped so he can pay back GMAC the 320 grand when they demand their money back.
Im confused by what Jerry's plan was. Does he need the ransom money to pay back GMAC the $320 000? If so, what did he do with the original 320grand they lent him? Or did I get it wrong?
What exactly did Jerry need all that money for? It was never really discussed in the movie. The implication was that he owed money to some loan sharks, but it was never completely explained.
Could've simply just been embezzling money. The bank loaned him 320K for a batch of cars that didn't exist (hence the madeup ineligible VINs) He probably took that money and either paid off personal debt or perhaps invested it very poorly. Either way, the only detail we need to know about his character is that he's hurting for money.
Jerry s biggest concern was getting the money. Now that they transferred the money he thinks he’s of the hook. That’s how these people think… briljant acting,
I also realized that Jerry has a Desk Blotter & Pen Set. I used to think they were so cool when I was a Kid. They also had one on an Episode on Man Men not to mention Dallas when Miss Ellie agreed to Drill on South 40 to "Save" The Southfork.
That money disappeared into his debt vortex the moment he got it. He may have had an idea or two of how to pay it back, but that's how bad off old Jerry was.
