MovieChat Forums > Fargo (1996) Discussion > Biggest plot hole of them all

Biggest plot hole of them all


The plot hole I am talking about basically crumbles the whole movie and destroys any believability this cartoon-style story would have had otherwise. Which is still not much..

So, Jerry's problem is that he needs money.

Jerry is married to a sweet, kind-looking, friendly woman, whose father is incredibly rich.

This woman's father wants to take good care of his daughter.

You put these three things together, and no matter how you slice it, you arrive at the following conclusion:

Jerry could ask his WIFE (who is supposed to support her HUSBAND) for pretty much any amount of money, or at least a reasonable amount, and there's NO WAY she would just coldly deny him. When that sweet, loving (?) wife looks into those big, beautiful eyes of her beloved husband, is she _REALLY_ going to deny any request like that, especially if Jerry can explain it?

Why would it be so 100% impossible for this woman to ask her dad for money, when she has probably had him wrapped around her finger since she was 1 years old (if not younger), and has always probably manipulated him for money, and he has probably showered her with material spoils - just because he doesn't like her husband, doesn't mean he doesn't want his daughter to be happy.

He would not deny money requests from his beloved daughter, especially if she explains that the family really needs the money. Jerry doesn't live or operate separately, as an individual entity and a loaner, any money Jerry gets, is eventually going to be shared with the wife, so there's no need for the grumpy old guy to deny Jerry money - women are VERY good at extracting their husband's money, and so on.

You can think of this from so many angles, and the end result is, the wife WILL and already SHOULD have a ton of money, the dad will provide her with money any time she wants it, and she's SO sweet, kind and even has 'that face' that would HAPPILY help Jerry - HER HUSBAND! - if he's in trouble, and do everything in her power (and believe me, she WOULD have power even over someone as gumpy as her father, EVEN IF he wasn't her father, but especially because he is!) to help him and get that money from her father.

There's just _NO_ way a wife like _THAT_ wouldn't a) be ABLE to get and b) be WILLING to get a ton of money for her beloved, hard-working husband with puppy eyes, no matter what kind of father she has, as long as that father is wealthy. And he is.

So this portion of the story and the movie, and how it's shown to us, is _NOT_BELIEVABLE_WHATSOEVER.

That makes it a major plot hole, maybe biggest in any movie.

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Daughter wants $40 000, why?

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i don't believe we know exactly what jerry has got himself into, but he's got a loan owing against cars that don't exist. we don't know why he took out that loan. but he's got a fraudulent loan that he can't pay back.

if he asks his wife for money, that will open up all kinds of questions from his wife & potentially the father in law that he won't want to answer.

& he's also trying to get his f-i-l to finance a deal that he hopes will make him solvent.

i don't really see any of this as a plot hole. the details of what jerry has done and what he's trying to do are pretty vague, and i don't think having more details would make the movie better.

he's in trouble, he's in over his head, & he's desperate. that's all we need to know.

i think fargo is a perfect movie.

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What they said...Jerry was literally desperate for money, he had falsified numbers on the cars he got a loan on.

His father in law was a very shrewd businessman and would certainly have questioned why his daughter needed 40, 000. Plus there is no guarantee she would have agreed to ask for the money anyway.

Yet another ridiculous thread about plot holes that are not plot holes at all.

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Jerry didn't need $40,000. He needed close to a million. He has been juggling a mountain of debt and is about to get into real trouble for the fraud he is committing with GMAC financing because he borrowed a ton of money using non-existent cars as collateral.

Wade is very protective of his money which is why he insisted on delivering the money himself.

If Jean had asked Wade for $1 million a) he would not have given it to her and b) he would have asked why and once he learned it was because Jerry got into debt he wouldn't give them a penny since he detests Jerry. He would have told Jean to divorce Jerry instead.

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I don't think it is.

Jerry comes across as a real sleazebag who has managed to get himself in to real financial trouble. For some reason he has created a scam with the bank regarding loans for non-existent vehicles. It's not explained why - gambling perhaps. He needed money to pay the bank back. He doesn't really get along with Wade, his father in law. Wade even says that "Jean and Scotty have nothing to worry about" (deliberately leaving Jerry's name out) when Jerry says that his family might be financial trouble.

Jerry, not being the brightest guy in the world, coming up with the kidnapping scheme is not a stretch.

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I don't think Jerry would ever want his wife to know he needed money, especially an amount like that. It would humiliate him to ask her to ask her father, and it would make him feel like an absolute failure in her eyes.

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I don’t know what avortac’s deal is, but he’s been posting similarly nonsensical rants on a number of boards

Things like how lightsabers are plot holes because you can’t make a sword out of light.

And here, this “plot hole” was literally addressed in the first scene — Steve Buscemi’s and Peter Stormare’s characters asked this exact same question: “why not ask your father-in-law or your fuckin’ wife y’know?”

It’s a ridiculous amount of effort just to troll, but some folks just have a lot of time on their hands

Best to click “ignore this poster” and get on with our lives

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Exactly. It's just the latest of the multitude of keyboard commandos that have the annoying compulsion to over/mis-use the term plot hole

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tbf usually he goes with "makes no sense" rather than "plothole"

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tbf, I said, "over / mis use the term" ...and [he] clearly misused it here

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I'm with you. I have never clicked to ignore anyone before, but this guy is just tedious.

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