The Coen Brothers Are Writing Together Again. Joel Directs "Jack of Spades" Solo.
Netflix announced Monday that it's acquired "Jack of Spades," a gothic mystery co-written by Joel and Ethan Coen — their first shared screenplay credit since "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs" in 2018. Joel directs alone. Theatres first, fall 2027.
The Coen brothers are back on the same script. Netflix announced on Monday that it's acquired worldwide rights to Jack of Spades, a gothic mystery directed by Joel Coen and co-written by Joel and Ethan Coen with novelist Eleanor Catton and playwright Conor McPherson. It's the brothers' first collaboration since The Ballad of Buster Scruggs in 2018 — also a Netflix release.
One distinction matters, and Netflix's own announcement keeps it clean: this is a writing reunion, not a directing one. Joel directs alone, as he did on The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021). Ethan, meanwhile, spent the split making Drive-Away Dolls and Honey Don't! with Tricia Cooke.
What the film is
Netflix describes Jack of Spades as "a sinister gothic mystery filled with intrigue and betrayal," set in the Scottish Highlands. It adapts The Alien: A Story of Middle Age, a 1901 novel by Frances Frederica Montrésor — an obscure source even by Coen standards. The story centres on a woman whose quiet life is upended by a charismatic stranger presumed dead thirty years earlier.
The cast: Patsy Ferran, Josh O'Connor, Damian Lewis and Lesley Manville. Behind the camera, two long-running Coen relationships resume — cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel (Inside Llewyn Davis) and composer Carter Burwell, who has scored the brothers' films since their 1984 debut, Blood Simple. Frances McDormand is among the producers. Production teams filmed in Glasgow last autumn.
Netflix will release it in theatres first, in fall 2027
Netflix will put Jack of Spades in theatres in fall 2027 before it streams later that year. No exact date is set. That's a cinema-first route for a filmmaker whose last Netflix title went the other way — and it lands in the middle of a live argument about how long a streaming film should stay exclusive to theatres, an argument being fought in public this month over a Brad Pitt film (see our Cliff Booth piece in this batch).
The brothers teased more collaboration at a career retrospective at the Lumière Film Festival in Lyon in October. Whether Jack of Spades is a one-off or a resumption, the eight-year gap between shared credits is over.
Sources
- Entertainment Weekly, "Joel and Ethan Coen reuniting for their first film together in nearly a decade" (Netflix press release, announced Monday Nov 2) — https://ew.com/coen-brothers-reuniting-first-film-together-nearly-decade-12208015
- Collider, "The Coen Brothers Officially Reunite After 8 Years for New Netflix Mystery" (Nov 4, 2026) — https://collider.com/coen-brothers-reunion-jack-of-spades-netflix-gothic-mystery-2027/
- Deadline's acquisition reporting, via ComingSoon (Nov 2, 2026) — https://www.comingsoon.net/movies/news/2216601-netflix-joel-coen-new-movie-release-update
Get the alert when it breaks.
DRAFTWhen a story breaks on a beat you pick, we email or text you. When there's an emergency in your ZIP, we text you. Nothing else, and no ads in any of it.
Check your inbox — and your phone.
Staging preview: those confirmations went to the desk's outbox, not to you. Nothing was sent.
DRAFT The signup wording, in full — for approval
Confirm your Mother Lode alerts
You asked The Mother Lode for alerts at this address. One click confirms it:
{confirm_url}
What you signed up for: breaking-news emails for {beats}; emergency emails for ZIP {zip}.
Alerts start only if you click. Didn't ask for this? Ignore the email — the signup dies on its own.
The Mother Lode — three editions a day, no ads.
The Mother Lode: reply YES to confirm alert texts — breaking news for {beats}, emergencies for ZIP {zip}. Msg frequency varies. Msg&data rates may apply. STOP to end, HELP for help.
You're in. Mother Lode alert texts are live for {beats} + ZIP {zip} emergencies. Reply STOP to end anytime.
Confirmed — you're on the list. The next story that breaks on your beats lands in this inbox.
You're already on the alert list. Nothing changed, and no new confirmation was sent.
{headline} — The Mother Lode
Mother Lode — {beat}: {headline} {url} STOP to end
EMERGENCY — Mother Lode: {headline}. Official resources: {url} STOP to end
Alerts need somewhere to go — add an email, a mobile number, or both.
That email looks incomplete — check it and try again.
That number looks incomplete — ten digits, area code first.
ZIP code is five digits.
Pick at least one beat, or add your ZIP for emergency alerts — one of the two has to be set.
THE MOTHER LODE — Edition Nº 003 · Midday, staging preview. Photos are real, licensed and credited on the page; designed cards carry figures from the article itself. Staging only — not the production edition.