I definitely agree that it isn't quite as "Coen" as other films of theirs, but it is one of their earliest films, and the most ambitious and well-funded up until that point, so I feel they were playing it close to the chest but with a healthy amount of experimentation, so I don't think the fan-boy take from the article is undue. I definitely appreciate the noir-detective aspect that the Coens love so much, but I think the only way the film suffers is that it's a bit light and hidden, unlike the dense emotional cartharsis that other mobster films rely on so much. Not that that is really a fault, but it sets it apart from what people expect, and feels a bit more real, as stylized as it may be, without the thick, plastered-on ethnic tropes and exploring the hidden motivations that dictate the irrational actions of their power plays.