Review
Seth Rogen’s The Studio might be earning well-deserved plaudits for its satirization of franchise filmmaking at major Hollywood studios, but it’s still no match for an absurdist 2016 comedy movie from the Coen brothers that covers similar ground. The Studio is set in present-day Hollywood, with cozy cameos from a host of film industry A-listers. Meanwhile, the Coen brothers’ Hail, Caesar! went back in time to around 65 years before its release date, so that it could go even further in lampooning Hollywood’s Golden Age.
By doing so, the movie takes down everything from Laurence Olivier’s failed foray into American filmmaking to McCarthyite blacklisting. What’s more, its comic touch isn’t applied lightly to protect the egos of any big-name guest-stars, like those who populate the cast of The Studio. The Coen brothers go all out in their send-up of the cinematic era that gave us Singin’ in the Rain, Rear Window, The Searchers, and Ben-Hur, but also plenty of hammed-up musicals, half-baked Westerns, and some terrible melodramas, crime capers and Biblical epics to boot.
Hail, Caesar! Is The 21st Century's Best Satire Of Hollywood
The Studio Is Good, But The Coen Brothers Movie Is Funnier & Goes Further
Relentless in its skewering of the kind of overblown productions which marked the beginning of the end of Hollywood’s studio system, Hail, Caesar! is really critiquing the same fundamental phenomenon as The Studio, only using a different era as its setting. Both satires take a dim view of large-scale movie projects that seem to prioritize quantity over quality, and highlight the negative impact that meddling from studio tops can have on a cinematic work.
Hail, Caesar! appears to revel in the making of big, bad studio productions, rather than despairing at the cynicism behind the boardroom handshakes that ultimately decide the fate of those productions, as The Studio does.
At the same time, Hail, Caesar! appears to revel in the making of big, bad studio productions, rather than despairing at the cynicism behind the boardroom handshakes that ultimately decide the fate of those productions, as The Studio does. In a sense, the joyful abandon with which the movie approaches satirizing Hollywood makes its critique cut deeper, precisely because it doesn’t appear to be making a point.
In addition, unlike The Studio, Hail, Caesar! goes into the full historical context that surrounded the Hollywood film industry in the 1950s, including McCarthyism, the Cold War, and the development of the US military-industrial complex. Although it wouldn’t typically make a list of the best Cold War movies, Hail, Caesar!’s depiction of the rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union from Hollywood’s perspective is among the most astute in modern cinema.
The Historical Setting Of Hail, Caesar! Makes It Easier For The Coen Brothers To Satirize Hollywood
Hail, Caesar! Being Set In 1951 Allows Its Filmmakers To Suggest All Its Jokes Are About The Past
In fairness to The Studio, it does still push the boat out when it comes to an unflinching satire of modern Hollywood’s major studio players, especially considering the names it’s managed to bring on board. Hail, Caesar! has a key advantage over Seth Rogen’s Apple TV+ series based on his own real-life experiences, by being set in a previous era of moviemaking. The film can go much further in its mockery of American cinema by suggesting that its jokes only apply to the distant past.
When The Studio makes a joke at a filmmaker, actor, or studio’s expense, on the other hand, it applies to people working in the film industry today. Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg and their team of writers invariably have to look over their shoulders and worry about who they might be upsetting. The Coen brothers had no such concern while making Hail, Caesar!.
Moreover, while The Studio’s central characters are all technically fictional, much of the show’s cast involves movie stars and filmmakers playing themselves. Every character in Hail, Caesar! is entirely fictional, even if they were based on real stories. Should anyone be offended by the resemblance of anything that happens in the movie to reality, Joel and Ethan Coen simply have to remind them that technically, they made the whole thing up.
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Set in the 1950s, the Coen Brothers' Hail, Caesar! is a 2016 comedy that film s Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin), a Hollywood fixer tasked with keeping the studio's stars in line. When the leading man of the studio's biggest film, Baird Whitlock (George Clooney), is kidnapped, Mannix must rescue him and save the picture's release.
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The Studio
TV-MA Comedy
9/10
The Studio is a comedy-drama film set in the high-stakes world of Continental Studios. It s a newly appointed studio head and his executive team as they navigate corporate demands and creative challenges, aiming to maintain relevance in the movie industry. Released on March 25, 2025.
