“Does this town need a hug?” quipped Oscar host Jon Stewart in response to the darkness of such Best Picture nominees as the Coen brothers’ “No Country For Old Men,” a writer’s movie with an award-winning screenplay by two writers’ writers, based on a novel by Cormac McCarthy.  Whether Hollywood needs a hug or not, Joel and Ethan Coen need nothing but their own talent to turn a novel with only a literary following into the best picture of the year.

Writing is not all the Coen brothers do.  They also produce and direct, together and separately.  But on this writing-for-writers blog, I think it’s a good idea to celebrate their love of words, their writing talent, and their glorification of all things literary.  Although they captivate mainstream audiences, there’s always a little something extra in Coen brothers’ movies for those who take a special interest in great writing and illustrious authors.

The brothers’ brilliance first came to my attention two decades ago with “Blood Simple.”  It had a screenplay that was at once character driven, suspenseful, brutally violent, and heartbreakingly literary.  It was as quotable as anything by Billy Wilder, Herman or Joseph Mankiewicz, or Phillip and/or Julius Epstein.  It stands as a masterpiece of Texas Noir, as good as anything Jim Thompson ever wrote.

“Miller’s Crossing” is a fun movie to watch.  But it’s full of extra fun for anybody who has read and loved Dashiell Hammett’s “The Glass Key.”  Just about every character has a counterpart in that classic, and every scene a send up of one of that novel’s many plot strands.  The hat that blows in the wind for no apparent reason refers to the clue that brought down the killer in “The Glass Key.”

A decade ago, the Coens’ “Fargo” netted them the Oscar for best original screenplay.  The dialogue in that movie dares to offer special thrills to anyone who has ever listened to the speech patterns of North and South Dakotans.

Perhaps the greatest film on writers and writing ever made was the Coen brothers’ “Barton Fink.”  Fink himself was based on the great American playwright Clifford Odets.  John Mahoney’s character was based on the great American novelist William Faulkner, whose long-time mistress and muse, Meta Carpenter, was represented by Judy Davis’ character.  John Goodman’s character was named after a character in a spy novel by John leCarre.  The movie ends with Barton Fink carrying his own personal writer’s block to the beach, where he meets his own muse, a woman in a swimsuit he had previously seen on a calendar in his hotel room.  He has stared at her, both on the calendar and in person, when he was supposed to be writing.