I think the music in O'Brother Where Art Thou is a very important aspect of the movie. It also helps parallel many of the parts from The Odyssey. Here are some of the songs I think are important and create interesting similarities between the movie and book.
You Are My Sunshine
This song signifies the hospitality aspect from the Odyssey. In the movie, this song tends to be sung when a group of people is being brought together. One example was during the scene where the senator candidate gets the group of people in the hall to sing it, after giving a "moving" speech and pardoning the Soggy Bottom Boys.
Down to the River to Pray
This song shows the significance religion played in O'Brother Where Art Thou. It can be seen as a parallel in the Odyssey as the importance of Greek Gods, as Athena tends to get Odysseus out of sticky situations and a "God" or something tends to help the Soggy Bottom Boys out of tough situations. For example, when Ulysses last minute prays to God before being lynched, and he (or a natural cause) answers his prayer and sends the flood. The main difference here is that in the Odyssey there was always no question about who was interfering in the mortals lives. In O'Brother, it is shown that there is some question of whether or not there's really a God.
I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow
This song does a good job of capturing the hardships that both Ulysses and Odysseus go through on their journeys home. For Odysseus, his journey is longer, but for Ulysses his is more mentally taxing (in my opinion). For Ulysses, he must convince two of his friends there is "treasure", thus lying to them while getting them to travel cross country to make it home and stop his wife from re-marrying, only to arrive home and find that his children don't remember who he is (similar to Telemachus barely having known Odysseus)
In the Highways
I thought this song was an interesting homecoming song in O'Brother. It does a good job of capturing the journey aspect of Ulysses travels home. I liked the way it was the children singing the song, because it truly a cute way to capture the way Odysseus has missed his children.
Music played at big role in the movie, especially the song "Man of Sorrows", which is a reference to Odysseus' namesake, and just the culture of country music overall. Country music plays an interesting role as, in a way, replacing the element of the epic. Country music in a way is epic, often telling the story of some adventure, heartbreak, etc... usually referring to specific people or events.
ReplyDeleteNice post, Siena! I wasn't really thinking about the music while watching O Brother, but now I can see how it strengthens the connection between the movie and the poem. I thought the Cohen brothers just used country music because it fit well with the setting.
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