Inspiration is a funny thing. The Cohen Brothers have done some amazing work in film, no doubt inspiring young filmmakers, while creating some cultural icons like The Dude. I still marvel at how they managed to take Roseanne's goofy husband John Goodman, and cast him in some of the most terrifying roles ever. Barton Fink comes to mind, but Raising Arizona was probably the bombshell that reshaped Goodman in many people's minds forever. What we couldn't have predicted was how the Cohen Brothers' first film, Blood Simple would inspire Chinese director Zhang Yimou. Yimou's film credits include Hero and House of Flying Daggers, and A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop is almost perfectly in line with what you might expect, a period-piece set in the remote countryside of what appears to be northwestern China. In fact, you could watch the entire film with absolutely no knowledge of Blood Simple and enjoy it immensely. It's full of color, intense action, and characters that may seem overplayed to Western audiences, but who still manage to hit the right notes. The subtitles convey just enough of a modern tone to offset the period piece aspects of A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop.

If you saw and loved Blood Simple, on which A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop is based, your experience will be completely different. With the Cohen Brothers' film in mind, every aspect of A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop takes on new meaning. To keep this spoiler-free, we'll just say that both movies turn on a series of tragic misunderstandings, and a bloody lover's triangle. The character played by M. Emmet Walsh in Blood Simple is recreated in A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop as a stalwart Chinese policeman with a dark streak. Walsh was, like Goodman, an actor that the Cohens shaped to their own end, against the grain of his typical roles. Perhaps the same subtlety is at work in the Chinese casting, which will be lost on Western audiences. What isn't lost is the menacing quality of greed that pervades the character in both films. The setting for Blood Simple even feels like it was translated to the stark Chinese countryside, complete with huge dark clouds that roll over the landscape like portents during key moments in the film.

If you love the Cohen Brothers' output, seek out A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop and take a gander. It has the same bizarre humor juxtaposed with tense humor that makes every film from the Cohens feel a bit dangerous. At just 90 minutes long, it's extremely compact, but still manages to bundle in some really impressive imagery and conclude with almost a scene-for-scene match to its source of inspiration. Rather than imitate or remake a modern Chinese version of Blood Simple, A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop does something much more ambitious. It mashes up two cultures and at least two distinct film styles to produce something that new audiences in both China and the West can get excited about. We're sure the Cohen Brothers were thrilled to see such a cool interpretation of their equally-cool original vision. Recommended.