Joel Coen distills ‘Macbeth’ down to the bone

Some of the intense conversation that Coen might normally have exchanged with his brother, he had with Delbonnel, poring over sketches and taking contemplative cigarette breaks. Their connection, Delbonnel says, is in questioning everything.

“Joel and Ethan were always questioning whether it was the right way to do something. There is no right way, but the right way for the movie,” says Delbonnel. “We both think Kurosawa was a genius.”

As much as the hurly burly of the Coen brothers’ movies might seem distant from Shakespearean tragedy, their films are crowded with schemers seized by misguided ambitions — just usually more farcical ones. It’s not a terribly far leap from “Fargo,” where foul was also fair, to “Macbeth,” or even from McDormand’s opportunistic personal trainer, Linda Litzke, in “Burn After Reading,” to Lady Macbeth.

“There are echoes of things we’ve done in the past in this play,” Coen says. “One of the reasons I’ve always loved the play is how Shakespeare anticipated or prefigured these tropes of 20th century crime fiction, this idea of a couple plotting a murder. While they’re not comically hapless or characters we’ve explored in that context in other movies, they nevertheless lose control of the situation.”

Coen’s “Macbeth” comes from a more mature perspective than is typical to the Scottish play. McDormand and Washington are both in their 60s; their Macbeths are making a last stab at the throne. There are parallels for the filmmakers, too.