MovieChat Forums > Fargo (1996) Discussion > Unnecessary violence

Unnecessary violence


The kidnapping of the wife was extremely stupidly and poorly arranged. I can't believe this 'nice familyman' put his wife through that.

The CORRECT way to do it, _of_course_, would've been for him to drug his wife with some kind of powerful, but harmless sleeping pill or substance that has a similar effect, then go to his office, and then the thugs would come, break the door (or come in with key but make it look like forced entry), grab the sleeping wife, keep her asleep for the whole duration, etc.

There was _absolutely_ no need for the whole thing to be so loud, so messy, so traumatic for the wife, so suspicious (noises like BREAKING GLASS sound would echo around that neighbourhood in that kind of weather pretty far, and her screams would come out because they stupidly broke the glass - plus, would the husband REALLY want his house's glass broken - it's cumbersome and expensive to have it fixed, and in the winter, that house is unlivable now because of the cold (sure, you can insulate it somehow but it's still a big inconvenience and nuisance)).

A sleeping wife in the trunk, no guns anywhere, would make the 'police inspection' scene also go through smoothly and without problems.

Any dumb thug should have been able to figure out all this, so this whole unnecessary violence kind of makes this whole movie unbelievable.

By the way, where was their home located? It looks like a gorgeous neighbourhood, but when I look for the 'filming locations of Fargo', I never find anything about their home - it even seems to be standing on some kind of hill because the view is so nice (when the wife is watching TV just around the time of the kidnappers starting to spring to action, when you look outside, behind the masked kidnapper just before he breaks the window, that's a pretty beautiful view to a nice-looking neighbourhood).

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You'd lose all the "authenticity" i.e. all the aspects yopu pointed out re glass etc

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Jerry, Carl and Gaear were dumb criminals. If they had planned this out meticulously and everything had gone smoothly (perhaps except for some twist near the end that allows Marge to solve the case) this would be a much more ordinary movie. The fact that they are bumbling idiots is core to the film.

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If Jerry drugged his wife then that would point an awful lot of suspicion towards Jerry being involved in the crime.

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Something that isn't brought up is that Jerry wanted to call the whole thing off but was unable to. He starts regretting the whole plan after he's come home to find his wife kidnapped by them.

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The major point of the movie is how unnecessary it all was "just for a little bit of money". Of course the violence is unnecessary. That's the point. Sloppy, impulsive, violent is the point. Good Lord. Good movie completely wasted on someone who can't see that.

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And then there would have been no need to make the movie at all!

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Unnecessary violence
posted 3 years ago by avortac4 (3766)
6 replies | jump to latest

The kidnapping of the wife was extremely stupidly and poorly arranged. I can't believe this 'nice familyman' put his wife through that.

The CORRECT way to do it, _of_course_, would've been for him to drug his wife with some kind of powerful, but harmless sleeping pill or substance that has a similar effect, then go to his office, and then the thugs would come, break the door (or come in with key but make it look like forced entry), grab the sleeping wife, keep her asleep for the whole duration, etc.

There was _absolutely_ no need for the whole thing to be so loud, so messy, so traumatic for the wife, so suspicious (noises like BREAKING GLASS sound would echo around that neighbourhood in that kind of weather pretty far, and her screams would come out because they stupidly broke the glass - plus, would the husband REALLY want his house's glass broken - it's cumbersome and expensive to have it fixed, and in the winter, that house is unlivable now because of the cold (sure, you can insulate it somehow but it's still a big inconvenience and nuisance)).

A sleeping wife in the trunk, no guns anywhere, would make the 'police inspection' scene also go through smoothly and without problems.

Any dumb thug should have been able to figure out all this, so this whole unnecessary violence kind of makes this whole movie unbelievable.

By the way, where was their home located? It looks like a gorgeous neighborhood, but when I look for the 'filming locations of Fargo', I never find anything about their home - it even seems to be standing on some kind of hill because the view is so nice (when the wife is watching TV just around the time of the kidnappers starting to spring to action, when you look


You take the dark humor out of this movie dude and read into it too much. I mean, you were dealing with a bumbling hitman and a ruthless cigarette smoking hitman

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Like the other guy said, drugging the wife would point too much suspicion towards Jerry, also there’s too many variables with drugging someone like either mistiming the dose or the wife not consuming it.

If Carl had just put the tags on the license plate they never would’ve been pulled over, but that still left the issue of Wade screwing up the deal and the wife still being left alone with the crazy Norwegian psychopath.

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