The Coen brothers on Judaism and Job

The film is being compared to Job because it centers on a seemingly decent man for whom everything suddenly goes wrong, without explanation, and his efforts to seek help from God are as unsuccessful as they are persistent.

The film is attracting a lot of attention, in the Jewish world and the film community, for its portrayal of Judaism, or at least of Jewishness. The film, for a major release, is almost shockingly insider-y, beginning with a short story filmed entirely in Yiddish (don’t worry - it’s subtitled), and the body of the film is permeated with Jewish concepts, language, and culture.

The depiction of Jewish family and religious life - in this case, in Minneapolis in the late 1960s - is often chilling in its nihilism (or is it just emptiness?), but many of the scenes clearly struck a chord of recognition among the audience at Brandeis, which laughed often and knowingly at characters such as the mind-numbingly boring, and unaware, Hebrew school teacher, and the string of rabbis whose pastoral counsel often featured a mix of anecdotes that went nowhere and a series of unanswered/unanswerable questions.

The studio production notes include a few observations about the role of Judaism in the film, quoting Ethan Coen saying, “Occasionally people would ask, ‘You’re not making fun of the Jews, are you?’ We are not, but some will take anything that isn’t flattering as an indication that we think the whole community or ethnicity is flawed.’’ And Joel Coen is quoted as saying: “People can get a little uptight when you’re being specific with a subject matter. From our point of view, ‘A Serious Man’ is a very affectionate look at the community and is a movie that will show aspects of Judaism which are not usually seen.’’

I asked Cathleen Falsani, author of “The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Coen Brothers,’’ what the Coen brothers are trying to say about Judaism. Her answer: “I would hesitate to take it as a commentary on Judaism. I don’t think it is a reflection of their faith. And I see a lot of tenderness, frankly, in the way that they are treating a lot of their characters. The rabbis are very faulty people, like we all are, but it’s not snarky.’’

Falsani said the common theme in the Coen brothers films is the so-called theodicy question - “Why do bad things happen?’’ “They raise more theological, metaphysical, existential questions in their films than they ever answer, which I think is brave,’’ she said. “What does it mean to be good? If there is a God, why is there evil? They cover everything from karma and grace to sin and responsibility and community.’’

She also argued that the film is not, at its core, just a Jewish film. “This is a really spiritually important film, because of that question of what’s the meaning of suffering. That’s not Jewish - that’s everything, that’s universal. It would be really shortsighted to call it a Jewish film and leave it at that - it certainly is that, but it’s more than that.’’

Gingrich tells of his journey to Catholicism

“I don’t know that I wanted to become a Catholic so much as I became a Catholic. I don’t know that it was volitional in that sense. Having gone to the basilica (The Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, in Washington) with my wife, who sings in the choir there, for about a decade, I think it gradually grew on me. And when Pope Benedict came to the basilica for vespers with the bishops, and my wife and the choir were singing, and I was allowed to come as a spouse - I had been talking with Monsignor Rossi, who is the rector of the basilica, for about five years, just about faith, and secularism, the challenges we have in the modern world with our civilization, and that afternoon seeing Pope Benedict XVI fairly close up, and both really believing in his central theme of ‘Christ Our Hope,’ and seeing the joy in his eyes, fundamentally different than the news media portrait of a severe German intellectual, something in me just was triggered. And I said to Monsignor Rossi that night that I wanted to convert. And we spent the following six or eight months studying with Monsignor Rossi, and it was more a process of becoming more and more comfortable that this was - this is - the place that I belong, and the taking of the Eucharist is the experience that enriches my life.’’

Highlights from Michael Paulson's blog. For the full blog, visit boston.com/religion. Follow updates on Twitter at @GlobePaulson.