"And for what? For a little bit of money? There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don'tcha know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well. I just don't understand it."

— Marge Gunderson

A critically-acclaimed American dark comedy crime film from 1996, written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen and starring Frances McDormand, William H. Macy, Steve Buscemi, Harve Presnell and Peter Stormare. Taking place in the Upper Midwest circa 1987, the plot concerns one Jerry Lundegaard (Macy), a bankrupt car salesman who stages the kidnapping of his wife in order to cheat a ransom out of her wealthy father. But then things go wrong.

Like many of the Coens' films, Fargo takes liberal inspiration from Film Noir, one of the duo's favorite subjects — but, rather than being a straight Genre Throwback (like Blood Simple and Miller's Crossing) or an Affectionate Parody (like The Big Lebowski and Hail, Caesar!), could perhaps be best described as a subversion of the genre. The film's story is a fairly straightforward tale of criminal intrigue and a dogged cop on a mission, but it derives much of its subtle Black Comedy from its setting, taking place in the famously friendly, folksy Upper Midwest. Likewise, McDormand's character Officer Marge Gunderson is a famous subversion of the archetypal Hardboiled Detective, being a perfectly nice, well-adjusted and honest law officer who spends most of the film galumphing around in a bulky parka while heavily pregnant.

McDormand earned the 1996 Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance, while the Coens themselves won for Best Original Screenplay. While accepting her award, McDormand (who has been married to Joel Coen since 1984) famously joked that all her years of "sleeping with the director" had finally paid off.

An aired-in-2003 (but filmed in 1997) television pilot starred Edie Falco as Marge, but in spite of its praise, it wasn't picked up. Noah Hawley developed an anthology series for FX, which began airing based on the film in 2014, with the Coens as executive producers.

This film contains examples of the following tropes, ja:

• '80s Hair: The hairstyles of the hookers whom Margie interviews and Jean all showcase that this film takes place in 1987.
• Acoustic License: Grimsrud fires a gun inside a car right beside his and Showalter's heads, and yet they don't seem to be deafened at all and continue talking right afterward.
• All for Nothing:
  • In the end, absolutely no one involved in the scheme profits. Jerry gets arrested after his wife and father-in-law die from his plot going awry, Showalter is disfigured, axed, and stuffed into a woodchipper for his troubles, Proudfoot is implied to be dragged off to court for parole violation, and Grimsrud is caught in the act and imprisoned.
  • It's implied that even if the kidnapping went off without a hitch and Jerry got his parking lot, the scam he ran on GMAC using fake loans would have eventually landed him in prison for fraud.
• Alone with the Psycho:
  • The film seems to be heading for this kind of climax when pregnant Marge Gunderson, the Brainerd, Minnesota sheriff, ends up at the remote cabin occupied by Psycho for Hire Gaear Grimsrud. She captures him easily.
  • To contrast, kidnapping victim Jean Lundegaard is in a similar situation with Grimsrud sometime earlier in the film while Carl goes to meet her father Wade. It ends much worse for her; when Carl returns, Jean is dead, with Grimsrud saying he killed her because she was screaming too much.
• And Your Little Dog, Too!: Carl threatens Jerry that he'll kill him, his wife and all his children if he doesn't bring him the money within a half hour.
• Anti-Climax: After most of the plot has wrapped up Marge’s confrontation with Grimsrud is just him trying desperately to run away and Marge shooting him in the leg.
• Anyone Can Die: And usually without warning.
• Armor-Piercing Question: When Stan asks Jerry how Scotty is coping with his mom's kidnapping, Jerry's facial expression suggests that this is the first time he's even thought about this issue.
• Artistic License – History: Norm is competing for his painting to appear on 29-cent stamps, but the film takes place in 1987, when stamps were only 22 cents.
• As You Know: Showalter has Jerry explain the entire scheme to him, for clarity's sake.
• Babies Ever After: The last two lines of the film remind the audience that there's a new life coming.
  Norm: [putting his hand on Marge's belly] Two more months.
  Marge: [resting her hand on top of his] Two more months.
• Bat Deduction: Marge meeting with Mike Yanagita and being told that his sob story of his "wife" dying of cancer turned out to be a coverup for him stalking a woman he had a malignant crush on until she moved away makes her suspect that Jerry wasn't telling the truth about any missing cars from his dealership.
• Based on a Great Big Lie: Most versions of the movie, theatrical and home video release, begin with a statement that the story was true, with names changed to protect those still alive. Yet the typical "all names and events are fictitious" disclaimer still appears in the end credits. Although they changed their story a couple of times - at one point they claimed they had read the story about a car dealer arranging to have his wife kidnapped, to undercover cops pretending to be criminals, which led the Coens to write a story about if the kidnapping had actually happened. The Coens eventually confessed that the entire story is fictional, and the statement is a thematic device meant to help the audience suspend disbelief. Apparently someone complained, because some DVDs are missing the pre-movie statement. Since the first bars of the opening theme play over the statement, it's replaced with a black screen during that time for those discs. However, as of the Blu-ray release, the statement was reinstated, and hasn't been removed since, so your DVD may vary. The only things that may be based on reality would be Jerry using nonexistent dealership vehicles to scam loans from GMAC (as happened from 1980 to 1991) and the scene where Gaear is stuffing Carl's remains down the woodchipper. Such a method of disposing of a corpse had been done before, as Richard Crafts of Newtown, Connecticut was convicted in 1989 of murdering his wife on November 19, 1986 and disposing of her body with a woodchipper.
• Bait-and-Switch: During the kidnapping, Jeannie sets it up to look like she's escaped out the bathroom window. A few minutes later, we and the kidnappers realize she's actually hiding in the shower. This is actually a savvy move on her part, but then she muffs her attempt to run for it.
• Bait the Dog: Carl immediately points out what a bad idea Jerry's plan is, and even starts trying to talk him out of it — before saying "fuck it" and committing to the kidnapping.
• Batman Gambit: Deconstructed. Jerry has his own wife kidnapped, knowing that his father in law would be far too arrogant to go to the police for help and would want to handle this privately. Unfortunately, he doesn't consider just how much of a Control Freak Wade is, and that he wouldn't trust Jerry to carry out the exchange of the money for Jean. This not only gets Wade killed, but also Jean as well.
• Being Evil Sucks: A bit of a running theme throughout the film is how the criminals all suffer and harm each other and innocent people in the pursuit of money which they ultimately don't get. By contrast Marge, the most kind person in the film, is content with her life and by the end she and her husband are, "doing pretty good."
• Big Guy, Little Guy: Carl Showalter, the skinny shorter criminal, and his partner Gaear Grimsrud, the taller more muscular criminal.
• Big "SHUT UP!": Carl shouts this to Jerry during their first phone call.
  Carl: DON'T EVER INTERRUPT ME, JERRY! JUST SHUT THE FUCK UP!!
• Birth-Death Juxtaposition: The scene of Gaear murdering his partner is followed by Marge lecturing him, and after a brief scene of Jerry failing to escape justice, Marge and Norm celebrate her child's birth to come in two months.
• Bittersweet Ending: The bad guys are either caught or dead, but they killed lots of people in the process, the money is most likely lost forever, Jerry's son now has no parents, and nobody really learns from their mistakes. However, Marge, her husband, and their future child will likely live Happily Ever After.
• Black-and-White Morality: Despite the very ambiguous tale, the motivations of the characters are pretty clear-cut throughout — Marge is a kindly, upbeat family woman, while Jerry is an idiot in over his head and the criminals he hires are scummy weasels. It's also the point; contrasting and juxtaposing the relative "innocence" of the locals with the nigh-sociopathic brutality of the career criminals — mostly for comedic effect.
• Black Comedy: Ranging from the almost botched kidnapping more resembling a Looney Tunes short gone wrong, to Showalter's whining as he bleeds heavily from his cheek...
• Blatantly Self-Defeating: Jerry’s plan to swindle his father-in-law out of a sizable sum of money involves hiring two petty criminals to kidnap his wife, who he intends to pay with a stolen car and a fraction of the money he intends to scam. The criminals have practically no chemistry between them, Jerry has them break into his house for the kidnapping, and nobody installs tags on the stolen car. This leads to the murder of a police officer and two witnesses, Jerry being blackmailed into paying more money than what was agreed on, and the hostage being killed by one of the kidnappers, who then kills his partner. Oh, and the father-in-law tries to stiff the kidnappers on the ransom, which leads to him getting killed as well.
• Boléro Effect: Carter Burwell's main theme — a dirgelike piece that begins with a lone classical guitar, then adds a string ensemble, then ends with a full orchestra playing fortissimo.
• Boom, Headshot!: Grimsrud gives one to the state trooper, and the blood spills into Carl's lap.
• Bribe Backfire: Showalter tries to bribe the state trooper who pulls them over, which only arouses his suspicion and leads to Grimsrud killing the trooper.
• Briefcase Full of Money: Carl is startled to find out that the briefcase he thought would contain $80,000 in ransom actually has $1,000,000.
• Broken Record: To accentuate the simplicity of the characters, most characters repeat the same cliches.
• The Cameo: Bruce Campbell as the man in the soap opera Grimsrud watches, although it was not recorded for the film. That's an actual regional soap that Bruce did indeed appear in.
• Captain Obvious: "Oh for Pete's sake! He's fleeing the interview! He's fleeing the interview!"
• Catchphrase:
  • "Aw, jeez."
  • "Real good then."
• Central Theme: Valuing material wealth too highly destroys people and those around them.
• Cluster F-Bomb: Proudfoot about halfway through the movie, when giving Showalter A Taste of the Lash.
• Coitus Interruptus: Showalter is getting it on with a prostitute, then Shep Proudfoot suddenly barges in, throws the woman out of the room, and starts beating the crap out of Showalter.
• Credits Gag: Musician and Minnesotan Prince was credited as "Victim in Field". In reality, the victim was played by one of the film's sound guys. Promotional materials for the film were eager to mislead audiences into thinking that a famous person would make a cameo because the Coens' last film had nearly killed their career and they thought this one would flop.
• Crime After Crime: The original crime was a kidnapping of his wife arranged by Jerry Lundergard as a scheme to get money out of his father-in-law to pay off his gambling debts. The hired kidnappers were just supposed to kidnap Mrs. Lundergard, take her to a cabin at a fishing resort, and wait for Lundergard to get the ransom money, which they would split. Unfortunately, Lundergard forgot to put a license plate or an in-transit certificate on the car he gave the kidnappers, which causes them to be stopped by a state trooper, who looks inside the car when he hears the kidnap victim making noises, and this causes one of the kidnappers to impulsively shoot him in the head. Not only that, but a car with a teenage couple witnesses this, so they have to be murdered, too. So an arranged kidnapping scam turns into a triple murder, from one screw-up after another.
• Decoy Hiding Place: Jean Lundegaard nearly escapes from Showalter and Grimsrud this way. She runs into the bathroom, opens the window — then hides in the shower. Her pursuers both think she jumped out the window, but Grimsrud lingers in the bathroom to disinfect a cut on his hand, and finds Jean almost by accident.
• Determinator: For a pregnant policewoman, Marge certainly does take a lot of risks, doggedly pursuing every option and never giving up the hope of finding another clue.
• Didn't See That Coming: Essentially, the entire plot. Jerry's plan was that his wife would be kidnapped for a day or two, he would get the ransom, pay off his debts, and no one would be the wiser. The three dead bodies that kick off the plot, the murder of his wife and father-in-law, and the unraveling of his lies as well as his father-in-law refusing to play ball leads to one problem after another.
• Didn't Think This Through:
  • Jerry's entire plan. He hires two thugs whom he doesn't know and probably can't control, on the recommendation of a violent parolee, to kidnap his wife, and lies to them about the full amount of money being exchanged. He doesn't consider that the thugs might try to blackmail him for more money or that his stingy, bossy, and distrustful father-in-law might try to interfere rather than just hand over a million-dollar ransom (most of which Jerry was going to skim for himself before giving the rest to the kidnappers). He also never considers how his wife and son will take the whole ordeal. Even if his plan had been successful, the paper trail of the GMAC car loans would make no sense and indicate some sort of fraud on Jerry's part.
  • It turns out for Wade that trying to play the hero and act tough with a trigger-happy criminal who's already in a bad mood won't end well. Even when he manages to get a shot off after Carl shoots him point-black in the chest, he's so dazed that he only grazes Carl, and still winds up dead for his trouble.
• Direct Line to the Author: Opens with a quote that reads "This is a true story. The events depicted in this film took place in Minnesota in 1987. At the request of the survivors, the names have been changed. Out of respect for the dead, the rest has been told exactly as it occurred." This is, for the most part, completely untrue. The Coen brothers did take inspirations from various True Crime stories in the writing of the script (a body being disposed of in a wood chipper, a man hiring hitmen to kill his wife) but the events, plot, characters, and settings were all completely fictional. Joel Coen went on to say "The story was completely made up. Or, as we like to say, the only thing true about it is that it's a story".
• Disappointed by the Motive: Chief Gunderson gives Gaear Grimsrud a dressing down in this fashion after discovering him disposing of his associate in a wood chipper in order to claim the full Lundegaard ransom. Too bad for Grimsrud that, having just murdered Mrs. Lundegaard himself, the ransom has been rendered pointless. The most Grimsrud can claim for it all is to be the sole owner of the tan GMC Ciera. And what really disappoints the chief is that the entire criminal scheme was all done for the sake of a little money. The way it's framed, Gunderson's words and tone of voice make it clear that she's not only disappointed with this motive, but seems to legitimately have trouble understanding why someone would do it.
  Marge: And for what? For a little bit of money. There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don't you know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well, I just don't understand it.
• Dismembering the Body: Carl gets hacked to pieces by Gaear, who then feeds the body parts into a woodchipper.
• Door Focus: The camera stays on the door when Marge leaves the house after breakfast. Naturally, she returns to ask her husband for a jump start. Watch it here.
• Dramatic Sit-Down: Jerry sits down and stares off into space when he comes back from having seen Wade's corpse and the money missing.
• Dumb Blonde: The sex workers Marge talks to. All any of them can say about Showalter and Grimsrud is that Showalter was "funny lookin'" and that Grimsrud was Swedish. And after some prodding, that Showalter was uncircumcised.
• Dying Moment of Awesome: Jean's father adamantly refuses to hand over the money if he doesn't get his daughter back first; he gets shot in the stomach for trying to be a hero, but before dying, manages to shoot Carl in the face.
• Establishing Character Moment:
  • Jerry's first scene includes a number of tells about his personality. He not only lies about being told the wrong time to meet the kidnappers to cover up being late, but he also blames someone else for it. Jerry refuses to take responsibility and blames others for his own failings. His big establishing scene, however, is when Jerry passive-aggressively strongarms a couple into buying a coat of protective paint they didn't want on their car. He's a weaselly cheat and liar who no one likes.
  • Carl does most of the talking in the first scene, interrupting Jerry, demanding explanations, and suggesting alternatives to Jerry's plan. Meanwhile, Gaear is half asleep, mouth gaping open and eyes mostly shut throughout the criminal conspiracy. They're a study in opposites: one high-strung and controlling, the other stoic and apathetic.
  • Wade gets one, too. He's sitting in Jerry's home, watching the main TV, but doesn't even greet Jerry when he gets home, then sharply questions Jerry and Jean's parenting later that evening. When Jerry asks him about the deal he proposes, Wade refuses to talk about it and then casually remarks that Jerry's wife and son have no reason to worry about money, pointedly leaving Jerry out. All of this establishes Wade as the shot-caller of the family, with Jerry as the powerless outsider.
    Jerry: This could work out real good for me, Jean and Scotty.
    Wade: Jean and Scotty never have to worry.
  • In Marge's second scene, after examining the dead state trooper, she comments that "...he looks like a nice enough guy...tsk...it's a real shame!" — showing her tendency to see people as essentially good right off the bat.
  • When Marge tells her deputy that she "doesn't 100% agree" with his detective work (regarding the dealer plates), she does it in the nicest way possible so he doesn't feel inadequate, but noticeably does NOT accept his apology for his screwup — but immediately cracks a joke to make him laugh. The scene has her instantly work out what happened the previous night based on the crime scene and figure out that the culprits were from out of town. It tells you all you need to know about Marge being both nice and clever, but no pushover.
• "Eureka!" Moment: When speaking to an old high school friend about Mike Yanagita, Marge suddenly understands Jerry's motives. You can almost see the light bulb turn on.
• Evil Is Not a Toy: A non-supernatural example. Jerry thinks he can enrich himself with no real harm to his family by having two out-of-town thugs kidnap his wife and that they'll do what he wants them to. But the nominally smarter criminal can't even control the violent impulses of the other one, so a jellyfish like Jerry has no hope at all. And he failed to think even the "good" part of the equation through — how his father-in-law and especially his son would react.
• Extreme Mêlée Revenge: Shep Proudfoot to Carl Showalter. After finding out Carl and Gaear’s shenanigans have jeopardized his parole, Shep repeatedly tosses Carl across the room, repeatedly kicks him, briefly strangles him with a telephone cable, and then uses said cable to whip Carl hard enough to leave bloody gashes. Needless to say, Carl deserves every bit of it and more.
• "Fawlty Towers" Plot: Deconstructed. Jerry heaps so many falsehoods together, and involves so many people in his scheme, it's actually surprising he manages to keep it going as long as he did. However, true to the trope, it all spirals wildly out of control, and by the time the body count starts coming into play, Jerry knows he's done for.
• Foil: Marge's family to Jerry's family. One is supportive. The other... not so supportive.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Carl's interaction with the parking lot attendant over $4 means that he's willing to get into a hostile argument over a paltry sum of money, even if he's in a position to get much more money. This is later shown when he argues with Gaear over splitting the car when leaving quietly would have landed him almost a million. It gets Carl killed.
  • Mike Yanagita pretends to be a nice guy, but is really a compulsive liar and stalker. This gets Marge to second guess her first impression of Jerry.
• From Bad to Worse: A money-making scheme gone wrong ends with, among other things, a guy getting fed into a woodchipper.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: The Lundegaards have an issue of Playboy in their bathroom magazine rack.
• Genre-Busting: Neo-noir/thriller/black comedy, and that's just to start.
• Good Guns, Bad Guns: Of the "revolvers=good, automatic=bad" type. The All-Loving Hero cop Marge Gunderson uses a Smith & Wesson Model 36 revolver, as do all the other minor cops shown in the film. The immoral and psychopathic Showalter and Grimsrud share a SIG-Sauer P226 semi-automatic pistol between them.
• The Good, the Bad, and the Evil: Marge Gunderson is the good, as she's an All-Loving Hero who can't understand how some people can be so cruel. Jerry Lundegaarde is the bad, as he is an immoral businessman who's willing to put his wife in danger to cover up his own incompetence. Carl Showalter and Gaear Grimsrud are the evil, for being the ones to commit the crime and kill quite a few people over the course of the film (even more so in Grimsrud's case).
• Gorn: Just look at how bloody the snow is as Grimsrud feeds Showalter through the woodchipper. Also the amount of blood that comes out of the head of the state trooper when Gaear shoots him. There is also Showalter's bleeding from the bullet wound in his jaw, and his horrendously inept attempts to patch up the wound.
• Gosh Dang It to Heck!: A theme throughout the movie. The Minnesota Nice populace tend to mince their oaths. When someone who's not a career criminal does swear, it gets a sharp chastisement.
• Greed: Almost everyone. The original deal the criminals made — which is enough for them to start killing people like it's going out of style — is for a mere $40,000 cash and an ugly brown Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera, which is not a lot in the long run. Showalter later argues with his partner over a couple of hundred bucks when he's already stolen a million, and it gets him an axe to the head. Even Wade haggles over the price on his daughter's head.
  Stan: We're not horse-trading here, Wade.
• Hanlon's Razor: All of the murder and mayhem that occurs in this film happens because the crooks are as vile as they are inept. Namely, it's all because of Jerry Lundegaard's extremely ill-thought-out plan to try to cover up his attempt to pull fraud on the GMAC for reasons that are never explained, and probably didn't work out. The plan, as far as he's envisioned it, is to kidnap his wife and use the ransom money to pay back the GMAC loan he'd lost. The fact he's going to traumatize his wife, that the people he hired to perform the kidnapping may be Ax-Crazy and greedy because they are criminals, and that the GMAC will just find it more suspicious that he just hands back the money after dragging them around for weeks with badly-made (because it's forged) paperwork for vehicles that do not exist has not occured to him at all and he spends the whole film trying (very poorly) to bluff his way out of trouble.
• Happily Ever After: The final shot involves Marge and Norm happily sitting in bed with the baby on the way. They even say they're "doing pretty good." There are no conflicts for these characters, and no implications of problems in the future.
• Happily Married: Marge and Norm "Son-of-a" Gunderson. They live a fairly boring, unglamorous life of suburban routine, but they most certainly love each other. They don't make any big proclamations of undying love; their love is shown in small moments, like Norm making eggs for her or Margie being so proud that his stamp was chosen.
• Historical In-Joke: When the stamp prices were increased in 1995 (a year before the film's release) from 29 to 32 cents, there was a heavy demand for 3-cent stamps.
• Hoarding the Profits: Jerry Lundegaard is prone to making lopsided deals that end up going badly for him. When making a business proposition to his wealthy father-in-law Wade, Jerry asks for a $750,000 loan that he can turn into a lucrative investment. Wade, however, says it's ridiculous to loan him that much money and only get his principal and interest back while Jerry profits when Wade could just make the deal himself and pay Jerry a mere 10 percent finder's fee. Then when Jerry attempts to cut a ransom deal with the help of two crooks, he tells them they'll get a $40,000 payment while telling Wade the crooks want a million dollars, intending to pocket the difference. This too goes wrong when Wade insists on making the ransom payment in person, resulting in the criminals getting all the money.
• Hoist by Her Own Petard:
  • Jean's attempt to escape during the kidnapping fails when she panics, runs out blinded by her shower curtain, and falls down the stairs knocking herself out.
  • Shep strangles Carl with his own belt and then whips him with it.
• Hollywood Cop Uniform: Taken up to eleven; the sheriff-like uniforms worn by Marge and her subordinates, with their seven-pointed stars and brown and tan coloring, are nothing like that of the real police of Brainerd, Minnesota, which are standard blue with an oval shield-shaped badge (however, the state trooper's uniform is more accurate). This seems to have been done deliberately to underscore the small-town nature of the characters.
• Hollywood Healing: Grimsrud does not seem to be in any pain riding in the back of Marge’s Police Car after being shot in the leg. This might be a case of Acceptable Breaks from Reality since he would actually be riding in an ambulance. But then we wouldn’t have gotten Marge giving him a memorable speech as she drives him to jail.
• Hollywood Law: Since it involved the death of a state trooper, the Minnesota State Police should have been investigating the murders.^note Though the State Police do get involved, as it's implied Marge and Lou are simply first responders — though they're mostly out of the picture until the later half of the film.
• Homage Shot: The scene where Carl buries the Briefcase Full of Money beside the road is a homage to a similar scene in the 1960 British film The Criminal where Johnny Bannion buries a suitcase full of stolen cash in an empty field.
• Hooker with a Heart of Gold: The two blonde sex workers aren't terribly bright, but they do come across as very friendly and rather sweet-natured.
• Idealized Sex: The prostitute hired by Showalter is obviously just doing her job without a whole lot of enthusiasm or enjoyment. Not that he cares.
• I Have Your Wife: Invoked. Jerry planned the kidnapping to gain ransom money from her rich father.
• In Medias Res: By the time the film begins, Jerry has already lost $320,000 that he stole from GMAC, consulted an ex-con to recruit two crooks, stolen another car, and started driving out to meet the crooks to set up a kidnapping.
• Inelegant Blubbering: Mike breaks down into pathetic sobs when Marge rejects him. Jerry similarly breaks down when he's arrested.
• Instant Death Bullet: The trooper, who gets shot in the top of the head.
• In the Back: One of the witnesses attempts to flee on foot after crashing his car only for Grimsrud to shoot him from behind at long range.
• It Gets Easier: Carl reacts with a resounding and shocked "Oh, daddy!" to the first murder. He gets more and more angry and psychopathic as the film goes on until he's casually murdering people, too.
• Jerkass Has a Point: While he is an asshole, particularly to Jerry, Wade is right to doubt Jerry's reliability, given his obvious lack of business sense. It is also perfectly sensible to not want to lend Jerry $750,000 of his own money to risk in a real estate deal where Jerry would keep most of the profits if it paid off.
• Karmic Death:
  • When Wade makes the ill-advised idea to play John Wayne with the kidnappers, and not follow their specific instructions, Carl gets fed up and shoots him dead.
  • When Carl decides to insult Gaear, who he already knows is a very unstable psychopath, over a small sum of money, he gets axed by him.
• Kick the Dog:
  • Carl heartlessly laughs as a scared and desperate Jean attempts a hopeless getaway, falling down in the snow.
  • Gaear murders Jean out of sheer petulance, and Carl afterwards over the car.
  • Shep beats up a man who simply asked him to keep the noise down and even gives the hooker a kick to the butt when she runs out of the room during his confrontation with Carl.
• Know When to Fold 'Em: Seeing how trying to get Jerry to sell Bucky a sealant-free car is getting him nowhere, he agrees to pay for the overpriced car just to get things over with.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: At one point while threatening Jerry over the phone, Carl says "30 minutes, and we'll wrap this thing up." He says this when there are exactly thirty minutes left in the movie's runtime.
• Leave No Witnesses:
  • After Grimsrud shoots the trooper, he tells the dumbstruck Showalter to drag the body off the road. Unfortunately, while Showalter is doing that, a car comes up from the other direction and slows down, the motorists having obviously noticed the dead cop's body. Grimsrud puts the Ciera in drive and chases down the two motorists, who overturn some way down the road. When he gets there, the driver starts to flee but is shot in the back by Grimsrud, who then steps up to the car and shoots the female passenger.
  • Carl murders the parking attendant (off-screen) after killing Wade in the parking garage.
• MacGuffin: The briefcase full of money that's buried and never seen again, although it does show up in the show.
• Minnesota Nice: Much of the laughs by this film come from the juxtaposition of the incredibly nice characters with the horrifically violent crimes that are taking place. The only people who aren't Minnesota Nice are the hired criminals, who aren't from the region. This is lampshaded by Officer Marge Gunderson when she examines a crime scene:
  Marge: I'd be very surprised if our suspect was from Brainerd.
• Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot: Defied by Grimsrud. After pulling Carl and Grimsrud over for failing to display a license tag, a state trooper begins to hear Jean's muffled screaming from the back of the car. Grimsrud promptly grabs the officers head and shoots him at point blank range.
• Misplaced Accent: The "Minnesotan" accents used by many of the characters are really more like bastardized Canadian accents, though Rule of Funny is in full effect.
• Mood Whiplash: The movie turns on a dime between small-town quirkiness that's played for laughs and coldly brutal violence that decidedly isn't — and even then, it's a comical amount of blood with film-isms thrown in. Just watch this scene. (Warning for mild spoilers). The trailer reflects this, as the first half is light-hearted and quirky, while the second half turns dramatic, before veering back into comedic in the last few seconds.
• Multiple Gunshot Death: Carl shoots Wade once in the stomach to shut him up when he insists he won't hand the cash without seeing Jean and then when Wade shoots back and grazes Carl on the jaw, Carl shoots him twice more in a rage and finishes him off.
• My God, What Have I Done?: The consequences of Jerry' actions only seem to affect him when he finds the corpses of Wade and the parking attendant.
• Narrative Profanity Filter: When Mr. Mohra, an upstanding citizen, describes a conversation he had with Carl Showalter, a less savory fellow:
  Mr. Mohra: So he says, "So I get it, so you think I'm some kinda jerk for asking", only he doesn't use the word 'jerk'... And then he calls me a jerk, and says the last guy who thought he was a jerk was dead now. So I don't say nothin' and he says, "What do ya think about that?" So I says, "Well, that don't sound like too good a deal for him, then."
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: The state trooper gets killed because he refuses to take Showalter's bribe.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: One is given to Showalter by Shep Proudfoot after Marge interviews him about phone calls made from a hotel the perpetrators stayed at. He's so enraged that he also assaults the escort Showalter was with and a man who comes to complain about the noise. Since Shep doesn't want to go back to Stillwater Prison, it's obvious he has motives.
• Non-Indicative Name: There is a grand total of one scene set in Fargo — and that's the beginning. Most of the action takes place in between the town of Brainerd, Minnesota, which is over 150 miles east of Fargo, and the Twin Cities, about the same distance east of Brainerd.
• Noodle Incident: The $320,000 GMAC loan for which Jerry forged the VIN numbers of nonexistent cars. The viewer never finds out for what purpose Jerry got the money, or how he (presumably) lost it. Jerry likely intended that part of the ransom money would be used to pay back the loan and get the persistent Reilly Diefenbach off his neck.
• Not Even Bothering with an Excuse: When discussing the exchange with the “kidnappers” Wade hesitates for a half a second, then outright tells Jerry he doesn’t want him mucking it up.
• Nothing Exciting Ever Happens Here: "I'd be very surprised if our suspect was from Brainerd." Well, the suspects are from out of town and are staying at a cabin nearby.
• "Not Making This Up" Disclaimer: The movie starts with a title screen saying that it's a true story. (The movie is completely fictional, but the Coen Brothers claim that some pieces of it came from various real cases.)
• Oh, Crap!:
  • Grimsrud's reaction to Marge catching him in the process of "destroying evidence" in the woodchipper.
  • Showalter finally realizing Grimsrud is about to chop him.
  • Showalter and Grimsrud being stopped by the state trooper, and Showalter most likely about to be arrested.
  • For Jerry, most of the film is a series of these moments, as his scheme unravels and involves progressively more violence.
• Offing the Annoyance: Gaear kills Jean after her screams get on his nerves.
• Outside-Context Problem: The villains are violent criminals who will go to desperate means for some money... They could not be more out-of-place in the sweet, small-town Upper Midwest. The antagonist who hires them is miles out of his depth. This contrast is very much a deliberate choice.
• Parking Garage: Where Gustafson goes to drop off the ransom money. It doesn't end well for him, the parking attendant, or for Showalter's right cheek.
• Passive-Aggressive Kombat: Jerry Lundegaard's Establishing Character Moment (while hiring Showalter and Grimsrud) includes him trying to make it look like he was not late, they were, in a very faux-meek tone of voice. The scene right after that has him swindle $400 out of a customer at his car dealership by giving him a car with an extra (a protective coat of paint) the man explicitly did not requested then going "oops! Ok… sorry about that, then. My supervisor tells me I can knock $100 off the price, is that okay with you?" The customer wishes to knock Jerry's teeth off, but decides to pay rather than keep making a scene.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: Shep beats up Carl after the latter almost got him in trouble with the police for kidnapping Jean.
• Pet the Dog: Jerry gently reassures his son that nothing bad will happen to Jean and later berates Carl for threatening to shoot him.
• Phrase Catcher: Carl Showalter is remembered by witnesses like this: "Oh, he was a little guy... Kinda funny lookin'."
• Pillow Pregnancy: Frances McDormand wore a pregnancy suit while shooting the movie because her character Marge was heavily pregnant and remarked that the extra weight and bulk really helped her get into character.
• Plethora of Mistakes: Jerry's plan falls apart almost before it starts. A lot of it has to do with the two criminals he hired screwing up due to their violent nature, which gets the attention of the police (precisely the thing they were trying to avoid).
• Precision F-Strike: When Jerry must deal with an angry customer who is furious at having protective paint on his car applied despite Jerry's promise not to do so, he curses, "You lied to me, Mr. Lundegaard. You're a bald-faced liar, a... a fucking liar!" Jerry's customer (and his wife) is visibly shocked at himself, and Jerry literally hangs his head in shame.
• Prolonged Prologue: The movie takes about 30 minutes, or a third of its runtime, depicting a complicated ransom plot that leads to three murders; it's only then that we meet Marge Gunderson, the police chief protagonist, who investigates the case.
• The Quiet One: Grimsrud, though for good reason. To the point that when Peter Stormare first saw the script he almost couldn't find his part! Shep also counts, responding in a similar manner as Grimsrud to Marge's questions, except for when he's beating Showalter for blowing his involvement.
• Ransom Drop: The ransom is supposed to be delivered by the kidnapped woman's husband who ordered the kidnapping in the first place. He will pocket his share of the money and deliver the rest to his partners. However, in the last moment the woman's father decides to deliver the money himself and refuses to hand it over until he sees that his daughter is alive. The kidnapper shoots him dead.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech. From Marge to Grimsrud.
  Marge: So that was Mrs. Lundegaard on the floor in there. And I guess that was your accomplice in the wood chipper. And those three people in Brainerd. And for what? For a little bit of money. There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don't you know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well, I just don't understand it.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The talkative, hot-tempered red Carl to Gaear's stoic and quiet icy blue. Somewhat downplayed, Carl's somewhat less likely to resort to violence first to solve problems than Gaear. as demonstrated when he and Carl were pulled over by the State Police officer.
• Refusing to Pay the Ransom: Wade (Jean's father) has no intention of paying the ransom that Jerry says Jean’s kidnappers are demanding. He ultimately goes to the dropoff point armed with a revolver and refuses to hand over the money without getting Jean, which leads to him getting killed.
• Roman à Clef: The movie pretends to be this, with text at the beginning of the film announcing that everything portrayed in the film really happened, with only the names of characters changed, out of respect for the dead. This is, of course, completely false; the film is entirely fictional. Apparently, the Coen Brothers added this to the film to make audiences suspend disbelief.
• Rule of Drama: Why does Marge drive to the middle of nowhere to confront Grimsrud, alone, instead of calling for backup? It's more thrilling that way^note Admittedly, she's on the radio when she sees it and says she sees it, so she knows backup is coming. Still, any cop - pregnant or not - should be waiting for backup, only staying close enough to be able to see if they try to leave, and follow them.
• Rule of Symbolism:
  • Jerry, after his plan to raise money to pay for the loans is subverted by Wade and Stan, is depicted in an extreme long shot of just him and his car, surrounded by snow, as he angrily chips the ice from his windshield. This moment emphasizes his isolation, ineffectiveness, and powerlessness.
  • With Jerry and Wade both having greedy traits, the pig figurines all over the Lundegaards' house are symbolic of that.
• Rule of Three: A minor example: twice Marge has a small slip on ice, but catches herself. When she encounters Grimsrud on the lake, she very carefully sets her feet down, to prevent herself from slipping.
• Scenery Porn: You'd be surprised how beautiful a frozen wasteland can be.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here!: During Jerry's second interview with Marge, he panics and decides to flee. The police later track him to a motel in Bismarck, where he is arrested trying to climb out the window.
• Senseless Sacrifice: Wade's daughter Jean was already dead when he went to ransom her from Carl. He lost his life and the ransom in a senseless display of power against someone like Carl, who didn't even care who the cantankerous old fart was. And while Wade didn’t know for sure that Jean was dead yet, he still made a very stupid move in the grand scheme of things.
• Sex in a Shared Room: A variation — Carl and Grimsrud both have sex with prostitutes in different beds in the same room. Afterwards, all four watch TV.
• Sherlock Scan: Arriving at a few-hours-old crime scene, Marge deduces exactly what happened with a quick survey of the area, then figures out that the perp's car had dealer plates by reading the dead state trooper's memo.
• Shout-Out: To Blood Simple, also directed by the Coen brothers:
  • Showalter getting spotted by a couple of motorists while dragging the trooper's body parallels the scene where Marty drags a barely alive Ray while a truck comes in their direction. Sadly for Showalter (and them), the motorists can't mistake the trooper for drunk like the trucker does for Ray.
  • Jean hiding in the bathroom to escape her pursuers is an inversion of what Abby does in her own scene: while Showalter assumes Jean escaped through the window when she was hiding behind the shower curtain, Visser checks the shower first before figuring out that Abby went through the window.
• Shoot the Shaggy Dog: For Jerry, at least. His attempt at trying to fund his business deal results in his wife being murdered, his wife's father being murdered, and him in jail — and before that, the business deal was going to fail anyway, and if it hadn't, he'd have been sued for another bad loan. And if the deal had gone through, Showalter would have buried the rest of the money instead of splitting it.
• Shown Their Work: Grimsrud's sociopathic behavior as a murderer. Him killing people in cold blood without a further word or thought just because it's an "ideal" or "quick" solution to fix his problems or because he's annoyed with someone is believed to be consistent with sociopaths who are routine murderers.
• A Simple Plan: The plan was simple, sort of: Jerry hires Showalter and Grimsrud to kidnap Jean and extort money from her father Wade so he can pay back a looming debt, paying them in advance with a car from his lot and promising them $40,000 of the $80,000 he claims he'll ask for. But the kidnappers get pulled over for lack of vehicle tags on the new car, causing them to kill the cop and two witnesses. This prompts a police investigation that gradually unravels the scheme. Meanwhile, Jerry tells Wade that the ransom is $1 million. Wade balks at the amount and insists on dealing with the kidnappers personally, which Jerry can't allow because he wouldn't get his cut. It all ends in disaster.
• Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism: For a Coen Brothers film that contains a lot of Black Comedy as well as a lot of amoral characters, it actually leans more towards the middle of the scale than far down cynical.
• Small Role, Big Impact: Jean Lundegaard. She's only on screen for a few minutes, but all the events of the movie stem from her husband's botched plan to have her kidnapped and ransomed.
• Snow Means Death: Occasionally, said snow is covered in blood. Look at the snow while Grimsrud is feeding Carl through the woodchipper.
• Stating the Simple Solution: Wade, Stan, and even Scott urge Jerry to call the police to handle the kidnapping. Of course, Jerry can't, since he orchestrated the whole scheme.
• Stealing from the Till: It's implied that Jerry's been doing this at his car dealership, and is on the verge of being found out, necessitating him to set up his wife's kidnapping to replace the stolen money (and make a nice profit on top of it).
• Stop, or I Will Shoot!: Margie captures Gaer Grimsrud by shooting him in the leg while he's fleeing from her. He had just thrown a heavy block of wood at her head, so it could be argued she was at least justified in pulling her gun to respond to assault with a weapon. Grimsrud's lawyer'll still have his work cut out for him at trial, though.
• Stupid Crooks: Jerry Lundegaard, thanks to his ransom plan being run on a whole lot of Didn't Think This Through-ium.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: The movie is basically a deconstruction of what you'll find in a crime-thriller.
  • After kidnapping Jean, Showalter and Grimsrud get pulled over by a state trooper because the car Jerry gave them doesn't have temporary tags. Showalter's first instinct is to try and bribe the trooper, who's not having it and tells Showalter to get out of the car. It isn't impossible for police officers to be corrupt in real life, but the vast majority of them aren't going to look the other way no matter how much money you offer them. You wave a few hundred dollars in a cop's face, and nine times out of ten, you're just giving them a reason to arrest you.
  • Several example happen after Grimsrud shoots the trooper.
    • Carl, despite being an amoral crook, is still rather shell-shocked by having a man murdered right in front of him, so close he gets splattered with blood. It takes Grimsrud telling him to hide the body to even register what just happened.
    • Afterwards, the short and scrawny Carl tries to drag the taller and heavier corpse on his own, to predictably slow results. It takes so long they get spotted by a passing car.
    • Grimsrud gives chase, but instead of a drawn-out car chase like the movies, the other car veers off the road and flips over. Turns out driving at full speed down an icy road in the middle of the night, without even traffic lights, is an accident in the making. Even without the driver probably being in a blind panic.
  • Wade tries to be a Papa Wolf, ignoring Jerry (who says that the kidnappers gave specific instructions about him being the one who made contact and delivered the money) and charges off to the drop-off himself with a concealed pistol. His Clint Eastwood act when confronting Showalter is completely ineffective, resulting in the latter shooting and killing him out of sheer exasperation, and exacerbates the danger to his daughter's life even further.
  • Disposing of a dead body via woodchipper isn't anywhere near as good an idea as it may sound. Not only does it take a long time, even without the woodchipper possibly jamming, it leaves a massive pool of blood that can't be cleaned and creates so much noise that Marge gets the drop on Grimsrud and yells at him from only a few feet away without him noticing.
  • Grimsrud is a dangerous psychopath but he's still human when Marge catches him unarmed and red handed, all he can do is weakly toss a log at her and run away, allowing Marge to arrest him with relative ease.
  • As Jerry finds out, being The Chessmaster is far easier in books and movies than in Real Life. Everything he plans winds up backfiring because of things he either didn't think through or had no control over, and it ends with his wife, father-in-law, and several innocent people all dead, him arrested while trying to flee, and his son now effectively orphaned.
• Suspect Is Hatless: Carl Showalter is on the receiving end of this. The best description people can come up with for him is that he's "kinda funny-looking" — no mention of hair/eye color, height or anything. Grimsrud gets even less because the only thing witnesses who saw him can recall about him is "looks Swedish".
  Hooker: Oh, he wasn't circumcised.
  Marge: [frozen smile] Was he funny-lookin' apart from that?
• Suspicious Ski Mask: Gaer Grimsrud and Carl Showalter wear these as they kidnap Jean. This is played for comedy when Carl arrives on her porch with a ski mask and crowbar, looking every inch like a crook as he peeks through the window, but Jean just stares at him in confusion.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Showalter and Grimsrud can't stand each other. Their personalities clash constantly while their circumstances force them to work together. It all comes to a head when Carl pushes his luck one too many times and is murdered for his troubles.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Showalter shoots Wade just once, through the chest, out of spite when Wade insists on seeing Jean. After Showalter gets shot in the cheek, he shoots Wade a few more times.
• These Gloves Are Made for Killin': Downplayed. After Gaear Grimsrud murders the state trooper by shooting him in the head. He instructs Carl to drag him off the road. Gaear does not wear gloves during this, but Carl puts some on before moving the body.
• Too Dumb to Live:
  • Showalter. First, he goes out of his way to insult Shep by telling him to smoke on a peace pipe which results in him getting beaten up in the process and then he shoots Wade only for him to get shot in the face in return. He also knows Grimsrud is an Ax-Crazy psycho who has murdered four people over the past few days, but still stupidly picks a fight with him over the car and refuses to pay him several thousand dollars for it, even though he had $920,000 hidden somewhere that Grimsrud knew nothing about. He pays dearly for that mistake.
  • Wade ignores the kidnappers' instructions that Jerry should deliver the ransom and brashly heads off to the ransom drop alone. He then argues with Showalter and refuses to hand over the money until he sees Jean. It doesn't end well for him.
• Trick Dialogue: After his wife's kidnapping, (which he arranged himself), Jerry Lundegaard sounds like he's desperately trying to explain to his father-in-law that his wife has been kidnapped, but stumbling over his words. It turns out he was just trying to find the right way to sound worried before he actually picked up the phone.
• Trivial Title: Only one scene (the opening scene in which Jerry meets Showalter and Grimsrud) takes place in Fargo. The rest takes place in the next state over, Minnesota, between the town of Brainerd and the Twin Cities. The film only ever returns to North Dakota once, in a brief scene near the end, and even then it's in Bismarck.
• Verbal Tic: Minnesotans pepper their statements with "Ah, geez," "ya", and "don'tcha know."
• Villain Has a Point:
  • Jerry's insistence that Wade stop trying to stray from the kidnapper's demands. He's doing it so that his scheme goes off without a hitch, but he's still right in doing so. As far as Wade knows, Jerry is correct in saying the kidnappers hold all the cards and following their instructions is the safest option. Wade deviating from the plan results in his and an innocent parking attendant's murders.
  • Carl correctly points out the flaws in Jerry's plan and wonders why he can't simply swallow his pride and ask Wade for the money and later gets justifiably annoyed at his poor planning and failure to get the money together. His frustration with Gaear is also understandable expecially when he claims that he should be the one taking the Cierra since he's the one who went collecting the ransom money, got shot in the face and as he says he's been up for 36 "fuckin' hours".
• Very Loosely Based on a True Story: The whole movie makes fun of this, as the opening says it's based on a true story, but the director says this was just a joke.
• Villain Ball: Grimsrud has one moment towards the end. After killing Carl, he decides to get rid of the body… by grinding it up in a woodchipper. Not only does this fail to hide the body, since it paints the surrounding snow red for yards around, it also creates such a racket Marge can pull up and find him within seconds without him noticing.
• Villainous Breakdown: Jerry has several minor breakdowns over the course of the movie, culminating in the final one when he's finally tracked down and arrested in Bismarck, making pathetic baby-man squealing noises as he tries to escape from the troopers. It demonstrates what an ultimately pathetic and inadequate man he is, and how far out of his depth he's gotten himself.
• Villainous Friendship: Averted with Carl but played straighter with Gaear Grimsrud and Shep Proudfoot. It's even possible that the reason why he killed Carl was because the latter threatened Shep. Though this seems more like caused by Carl's refusal to pay him for half for the Ciera.
• Visual Pun: Grimsrud kills Carl with an axe, like the lumberjack Paul Bunyan, whose statue has appeared cryptically in several shots. Grimsrud stares at the statue while being driven back to Brainerd.
• Vomiting Cop: Subverted. When Marge inspects the overturned car with the dead woman inside, she squats, about to vomit... from morning sickness. It passes quickly.
• Wacky Cravings: Averted. Marge eats pretty normal food (and fast food on top of it). She just eats a lot of it.
• Was It Really Worth It?: Marge Gunderson asks Grimsrud if "a little bit of money" was really worth all that murder.
• What Happened to the Mouse?:
  • After all this drama over "a little bit of money," a big chunk of the money itself ($920,000) is never recovered. The only person who knows where it's hidden is dead. In the first season of the TV series, it is established that a Greek immigrant named Stavros Milos found the money days after it was buried and parlayed it into a chain of grocery stores called Phoenix Farms.
  • The eventual fate of Jerry and Jean's son, Scotty, is never revealed, though presumably, having lost his mother and grandfather to criminals and his father to prison, he would be taken into care. Wade earlier said that Scotty and his mother will be OK (pointedly not including Jerry), which suggests that he has a will that would give her and Scotty his money in the event of his death. Scotty will have a tough time emotionally and personally, but at least he'll most likely be perfectly fine financially.
  • Shep Proudfoot is never mentioned after Showalter and Grimsrud's final argument and his fate is left uncertain, although he most likely will go back to prison for his involvement in the scheme.
• Wood Chipper of Doom: Psychopathic criminal Gaear Grimsrud murders Carl Showalter with an ax, chops the body up into little pieces, then shoves the pieces into a ridiculously small wood chipper, which has jammed by the time Marge Gunderson arrives at the scene, horrified by how sociopathic Grimsrud is. With all the noise the chipper is making, it takes him a moment to realise she's there pointing a gun and shouting, "POLICE!" at him.
• Worldbuilding: The Coen Brothers manage to make every character and place real. As noted by Roger Ebert:
  Ebert: Kristin Rudrud has few scenes as Jerry's wife, but creates a character out of them, always chopping or stirring something furiously in the kitchen. Their teenage son, who excuses himself from the table to go to McDonald's, helps establish the film's milieu with a bedroom that has a poster on its wall for the Accordion King◊.
• Xanatos Speed Chess: A significant amount of the film's comedy revolves around how Jerry Lundegaard finds himself in a game of this after his plan to have his wife kidnapped is going to hell in a handbasket and he turns out to be absolutely atrocious at it. He does not stop trying at first, but the only reason Chief Gunderson does not catch on immediately is because she does not believe he could be nasty enough (at first), but by the final act with his wife and father-in-law dead, three more people (including a State Trooper) dead as attempted damage control and the money gone, Jerry just runs and hides and is dragged out by the police literally squealing like a pig.

Yah!