Hang Me: Llewyn Davis as Gilgamesh
This article contains spoilers for Inside Llewyn Davis and The Epic of Gilgamesh.
At the turn of the twenty-first century, great American filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen famously adapted Homer’s epic Odyssey through the sun-soaked lens of a 1937 rural Mississippi prison escape in O Brother, Where art thou?—complete with tangential side quests, a one-eyed Bible salesman, and seductive sirens imprisoning men one way or another. Over a decade later, the brothers would pen and direct Inside Llewyn Davis (2013), a relatively unsung masterpiece about the trials and tribulations of the titular homeless folk singer whose grace is present much more in his music than his manners, as he comes to terms with a significant personal loss. Widely interpreted as the brothers’ second go at Homer’s poem (they wink at the audience with a cat named Ulysses), Llewyn Davis this time mirrors Odysseus’ journey and interrogates Homer’s musings through much denser, post-modern cinematic language as it grapples with fate, home, and purpose on a seemingly aimless seven-day journey in early ‘60s New York. Yet, as mourning propels Llewyn far and wide in search of a reason to endure it all, the film evokes a different tale equally pivotal to the human canon–one over a millennium older than Homer’s classic.
All images courtesy of Mike Zoss Productions and StudioCanal.
Inside Llewyn Davis is a devastating film, and, on paper, not a particularly pleasant one to watch. Very loosely based on the life and memoir of real-life folksinger Dave Van Ronk, the story unwinds over a short week (that feels like an eternity) in the life of the down-on-his-luck, broke, and implicitly homeless Llewyn. Yet through all the turmoil, the graceful approach of The Coens and a striking humanity emanating from a yet-unproven Oscar Isaac make for a bitter tenderness that feels almost comfortable. It goes without saying that Llewyn is also an asshole: he gets his friend (and occasional housemate)’s girlfriend pregnant, drunkenly harasses performers at the open-mic Gaslight Café he frequents, and abandons two (2) cats.
The film opens with Llewyn serenading both the film’s audience and local crowd at the Gaslight with a rendition of Van Ronk’s Hang Me, Oh Hang Me. He is then told to meet a mysterious man claiming to be his friend out back in the alley. Walking out into the cold, Llewyn is criticized by the shadowy figure for “opening his big mouth” and “yelling his crap,” before he is beaten and left bloodied. “We’re leaving this cesspool, you can have it,” says the man as he trails away. It’s hard to tell exactly what’s happening in these first few minutes. Llewyn appears to be a soft-spoken, beautifully talented musician. On the other hand, he seems to have really pissed someone off.
This discrepancy works to keep us engaged with an otherwise disdainful protagonist, but as the film burns on, the wax of our—and everyone around him’s—patience with Llewyn dwindles until there is barely anything left to keep him illuminated. Deep within Llewyn Davis is a heartfelt, incredibly talented singer, but his innate defensiveness and disinterest in amicability make him near indefensibly unlikable. Near does heavy lifting there, as we gradually come to learn that some time before the film’s events, Llewyn’s best friend and singing partner Mike Timlin suddenly threw himself off the Brooklyn Bridge.
The Epic of Gilgamesh, or the approximate 70 percent that remains of its original Mesopotamian form, opens with a description of the village of Uruk. The eighteenth line of the first tablet reads “Climb the walls of Uruk, walk its length,” and carries this description through the 23rd line: “There—is it not made of oven-baked bricks? Did the Seven Sages not lay its cornerstone? Look: Two thousand acres for the city, two thousand acres for the orchards, two thousand acres for the pits of clay, and one thousand acres for the temple of Ishtar. Seven thousand acres is the size of Uruk." Gilgamesh, the tyrant king, rules over these acres with an iron fist. As the epic tells, the eighteen-foot-tall two-thirds man/one-third god was created by the goddess Aruru, who, in response to the pleas of the people of Uruk, grabs a lump of clay and creates the “hero Enkidu” in the forest: a “son of silence, woven for war” to dethrone the despot (I, 104-5).
Of course, after only a brief tussle and ensuing conversation (the majority of which remain lost to time), Enkidu and Gilgamesh emerge as inseparable companions. Often cuddling and kissing, many modern scholars and audiences debate the presence of a sexual backbone in the pair’s relationship, which can certainly be labeled that of soulmates regardless of definitive romance. Immediately, the two set off to conquer the evil creature Humbaba, who rules over the Cedar Forest. With Enkidu getting cold feet, Gilgamesh speaks words of encouragement: “My friend, take hold of me. We will go as one. Let your heart speak war! Forget death, chase life” (Tablet V, 45-47). After several tablets of bond-strengthening adventure, they are able to slay the beast with ease. This act, however valiant, displeases the gods, who, as vengeance for the pair's act of power imbalance, smite Enkidu with a debilitating, terminal illness.
Save for a brief glimpse of an album cover, we never see Mike Timlin on screen–an expert directorial decision that emphasizes the weight of his absence. Without flashbacks or really even many stories, Llewyn’s characterization makes it clear how much Mike meant to him. In a scene where he is asked to play a song for the Gorfeins, whose couch he frequents as a bed, Llewyn chooses one originally performed by both him and Mike. When Lillian Gorfein attempts to sing along in place of the missing part, Llewyn snaps at her, leading to an obscene outburst that leaves Lillian in tears. Tangentially, earlier in the film, Llewyn loses the Gorfeins’ cat through an open window. When he sees a similar-looking stray, he mistakes it for the original and takes it to the Gorfeins at this dinner. After his aforementioned breakdown, he prepares to leave, when an already crying Lillian notices the cat he brought back lacks a scrotum and is thus not actually their beloved pet, kicking out both Llewyn and the stray. One and the same.
This moment is really all we need to understand Mike’s role in Llewyn’s life, and it’s frankly all we get. Llewlyn doesn’t aggressively self-defend simply because Mike was mentioned; he does so because Lillian generously tries to support him. This shell Llewyn has built around himself–his desire to sing, and persevere, on his own–is not open to unprompted harmony, even from a friend. This insistence on grieving alone is Llewyn’s biggest flaw; while it’s hard not to feel bad for him, it’s even harder not to feel terribly uncomfortable for all at the dinner table.
In the wake of Enkidu’s sudden death, Gilgamesh publicly and aggressively mourns in a sequence largely lost to time. He loudly laments his friend, evokes various deities to weep for him, and strips naked in anguish while beckoning goldsmiths and stonecutters in earshot to make memorials. As he wanders, he ponders aloud: “I too will die. Am I not like Enkidu? Grief has stepped into my heart,” (IX, 3-4), and it is this “fear of death” that leads him “through the wild / toward Uta-napishti” (5-6). Gilgamesh, suddenly fearing his own demise and curious about the purpose of it all, seeks Uta-napishti, known biblically as Noah, in Dilmun, a faraway paradise.
Meanwhile, after his visit to the Gorfeins, a shameful Llewyn finds himself seeking Bud Grossman—a club-owner/manager in Chicago who Llewyn previously sent a record sample to, receiving no response. Throughout the narrative, Bud has embodied Llewyn’s drive and search for purpose. As Llewyn’s life proves more and more hopeless, he sees musical success–something Bud can provide so long as he would actually listen–as his reason to hang on. To get there, Llewyn tags along with friend-of-a-friend musician Roland Turner and his companion Johnny Five. When the group stops at a diner somewhere between New York and Chicago, Llewyn relieves himself in a stall, where he notices the words “What are you doing?” inscribed on the wall. Immediately after, he hears the thud of Roland collapsing from a heroin overdose on a neighboring toilet. Subsequently, as Johnny drives the unconscious Roland and a far-too-awake Llewyn that night, a cop pulls them over and, in a rather surreal moment, arrests only Johnny for suspicious behavior. This arrest leaves Llewyn, Roland, and the not-Gorfeins’ cat in the backseat on a dead-of-winter night. Taking a final glance at his situation, Llewyn steps out of the car, stares at the cat and the sleeping Roland one last time, and closes the door on both before sticking out his thumb and wandering down the road.
Here, Llewyn confronts his mortality, just as Gilgamesh does. Yet where the latter vocalizes his anguish clearly to both the reader and anyone willing to hear, Llewyn’s self-war wages silently. “What are you doing?” ask the walls surrounding him… and he doesn’t have an answer. His newfound companion is killing himself over the toilet next to him, a stray kitten (the embodiment of all his burdens) sitting in the car quietly purring, and he still doesn’t have money to abort his best friend’s girlfriend’s child that may or may not be his. As desperate as Llewyn is for purpose, he is a far cry from doing anything meaningful with his gifts, and seeks answers in this mystical figure he has surmised exists out there: his Uta-napishti, Bud Grossman.
After a misadventurous two-tablet journey, Gilgamesh arrives at the feet of Uta-napishti, the immortal man who rescued Earth and all life on it from the Great Flood: “I look at you, Uta-napishti, and your body is no different, you are just like me… Tell me, how did you find eternal life in the gathering of gods?” (XI, 2-7). Uta-napishti thus chronicles the story of his arduous existence. He reveals he was granted eternal life as a reward for his great Noachian service, and in turn asks Gilgamesh to prove his worthiness of the same gifts by staying awake for seven nights.
When Llewyn arrives at Bud’s club, he is far too early, and sits and plays his guitar in wait. Finally, Bud arrives, and his office is revealed to be a humble cubicle surrounded by stacks of paper and miscellaneous records. The space is solemn and candid; there is nothing special here after all. To add insult to injury, Bud doesn’t even know who Llewyn is; he never got the record. With Llewyn right there in front of him, Bud asks to hear a live audition.
Alas, Gilgamesh is taken by sleep. “Look at that young man,” remarks Uta-napshti, “who wants eternal life! Sleep blows over him like a fog” (IX, 213-214). Gilgamesh remains asleep for a week, and only after Uta-napishti wakes him does he realize immortality was never meant for him at all. At the realization of his mistake, he fearfully pleads, “The Thief of Life has a hold on my heart. Death is sitting in my bedroom…Where should I go?” (IX, 243-245). Uta-napishti does not reply, and rather sends the boatman Ur-shanabi to have Gilgamesh bathed as cleanly as possible and sent on his way, “Until he arrives home in his city, until he reaches the end of his road” (IX, 258-259). This harsh truth, one of the most important in the history of literature, reminds Gilgamesh why he mourns and who he mourns for. The true purpose comes from the lack of any; the meaning of life is in fact that we must die.
Llewyn’s rendition of The Death of Queen Jane is a beautiful serenade that lasts three long minutes. After a pause, Bud exclaims dryly: “I don’t see a lot of money here.” When Llewyn asks if he’s as good as Troy Nelson, another singer on Bud’s payroll, Bud says Troy’s a “good kid, he connects with people.” He tells Llewyn he’s “okay,” and suggests he join a trio Bud is putting together, to which Llewyn declines, replying, “I had a partner.” In a bleakly comedic moment, Bud’s final words to Llewyn are: “My advice? Get back together.”
Both protagonists suddenly find their idols demystified, and themselves without answers, as the threat of death arriving at a life of unfulfillment proves ever more threatening.
Recognizing how much Gilgamesh strained to get here, Uta-napishti whispers a final, tantalizing secret to him: that a plant does exist, down in the Apsû, that can indeed grant immortality. In a revelatory, climatically exciting moment, Gilgamesh sinks down and plucks it. He takes it with the boatman on their journey back to Uruk, planning to feed it to an old man to see if it really will reverse his aging. Alas, after hundreds of miles, he puts the plant down to rest and bathe. Unbeknownst to him, it is stolen by a snake and lost forever.
Thus, with both our heroes devastated, empty, and without the purpose they sought, they wander their way back home. For Gilgamesh, this means taking Ur Shanabi, the boatman, to the walls of Uruk. For Llewyn, it means going back to all his troubles and still without money or a home. In the penultimate scene of the film, Llewyn watches an elderly woman perform at the Gaslight. There, he heckles her southern attire, asking about her “hay bale” and whether or not she’s wearing gingham panties, before making her cry with a final “Oh God, I hate fucking folk music.” He is thrown out into the street.
As Gilgamesh returns to Uruk, he turns to the boatman, and a stream of recognizable words begins to flow from his mouth: “Climb the walls of Uruk, walk its length…”
Likewise, in the film’s abrupt final moments, Llewyn is back in the Gaslight in new attire and without consequence. He plays the folk classic Fare Thee Well, or Dink’s Song. “If it was never new, and it never gets old, then it's a folk song,” he proclaims. When Llewyn returns to the counter, something nostalgic plays out. Poppi, the bar owner, tells him he was “a mess last night” and that there is a man out back looking for him.
“Survey the foundation, study the brickwork,” Gilgamesh continues. “There—is it not made of oven-baked bricks? Did the Seven Sages not lay its cornerstone? Look: Two thousand acres for the city, two thousand acres for the orchards, two thousand acres for the pits of clay, and one thousand acres for the temple of Ishtar. Seven thousand acres is the size of Uruk."
As Gilgamesh ends the Epic right where it began, Llewyn walks outside. “Had to open your big mouth,” says the man, before he pummels Llewyn. “We’re leaving this cesspool, you can have it,” this time adding: “My wife up there, trying to sing.” The film ends as a bloodied Llewyn, with nothing left but life, stumbles out into the street from the opening scene and watches the man speed away in a taxi.
Llewyn Davis and Gilgamesh are both deeply complicated heroes who face sudden, inexplicable loss. In search of purpose and fearing their own mortality, they seek out a mythologized authority, who turns out to be just as undecorated and disappointingly meandering as themselves. Dejected, both return home, as their respective texts end right in the moment of their inception: a loop of desperation, dejection, and pity. Llewyn’s greatest fault, as read by the audience and quite literally stated by characters, is his inability to harmonize. In the wake of Mike’s death, he wanders alone across the country to be granted meaning by higher forces that simply don’t exist. He believes in his ability but doesn’t see any meaning to it all. What are you doing?
Gilgamesh, the God-Man tyrant, is crippled by fears of death and unfulfillment in the absence of his best friend. He is inconsolable, unable to quell his deific power with newfound loneliness. On their respective journeys, both figures learn the hard way that mortality doesn’t quite come with anything greater. There is no significant meaning, no mystical answer, no inherent purpose. Both stories are anchored in bleak nihilism, but they aren’t hopeless. The end is terrifying and unavoidably impending, but it has not come yet. For the Coens, this is why art matters. Music is forever, and creation leaves an impact. Dave Van Ronk was certainly not the most famous folk singer out there, but he has now left an indelible imprint on both music and film, thanks, in part, to them. For the Epic of Gilgamesh, as much as it hurts to lose those you care for, to have something to mourn means to have had an exchange of love, to have given and received something beyond words.
So climb the walls of Uruk and see what makes home, home; Play a folk song for no one to hear. “Forget death,” says Gilgamesh to his best friend. “Forget death and chase life.”
Carlos Jimenez is a sophomore at Columbia College studying Film and Psychology. He enjoys writing, running, and fantasy baseball.