When folks from other parts of the country learn I live in
Minnesota, they usually ask three things: 1) Does it really get that cold
there? 2) Do you know Prince? 3) Is it just like Fargo? The answers are, of course, 1) Yes. 2) No. 3) Sorta. The
Coen brothers’ classic isn’t a documentary by any means, but it gets a lot of
things exactly right.
"Well, that
don't sound like too good a deal for him, then."
I know quite a few Minnesotans who resent Fargo because “we don’t really talk like
that.” It’s true that some of the accents are far broader than you’ll usually
hear in the Twin Cities metro region, but some are so spot-on that all is
forgiven. No performance is more Minnesotan than Bain Boehlke as the deadpan Mr.
Mora, the bartender who takes a break from shoveling to tip the cops off to a
funny-looking guy “goin’ crazy out dere at da lake.” My mom’s family is from Coon Lake, a rural
community about 30 miles north of Saint Paul. If one of her uncles had ever
been a vital witness in a murder case, the police interview would have sounded
almost exactly like this.
Good Company
Steve and Sharon Edelman are members of the Minnesota Broadcasting
Hall of Fame for good reason. Their dopey, cheery chat show Good Company was a local institution
throughout the ‘80s, an oasis of gentle good-nature in the desert of daytime TV
depravity. In other words, it’s exactly what a suburban housewife like Jean
Lundegaard would be chuckling softly at over her knitting on a snowy weekday afternoon.
“It’s always more!”
The most unsung hero of the Fargo ensemble is Gary Houston as the frustrated customer trying to
cut through Jerry Lundegaard’s car dealer double-speak. He embodies Minnesota
Nice stretched to its breaking point. Everything about his delivery of “You
lied to me, Mr. Lundegaard. You’re a bald-faced liar. A… fffucking liar!” is
Minnesotan to the core. As angry as he is, he still addresses Jerry as “Mr.
Lundegaard” in a show of respect for his position, and of disappointment that
Jerry isn’t earning that respect. And then there’s that brief pause. That split
second of silence tells us that this is a guy who never curses. Even here, in a
situation that obviously calls for it, he has to psych himself up before
pulling out the big guns. (Jerry has a point, though. In a Minnesota winter,
you’re gonna want the Tru-Coat.)
Jerry’s frozen
meltdown
Granted, Jerry is venting frustration with something a
little bigger than a Minnesota winter here. Still, there’s not a motorist in
the upper Midwest who can’t sympathize with this scene. The misery of chopping away
at a thick-caked windshield, knowing that the immediate reward for your labor
will be a soul-killing commute down ice-slicked highways, is enough to make
anybody flip out. What makes this scene quintessentially Minnesotan, though, is
Jerry’s follow-up to his brief tantrum. He picks up the scraper, collects
himself and gets back to the loathsome task at hand. That’s what you do in
these parts, mainly because it’s all you can
do.
