NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN (2007) (****)
29 11 2007 |
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It’s hard to believe my next statement is true. This is the best film the Coen Bros. have ever made. With brilliant films like BLOOD SIMPLE and FARGO in their resume, it’s strange to see a new film from master filmmakers and know it’s their best work to date. I mean you don’t expect Martin Scorsese to make another GOODFELLAS, but then you probably wouldn’t have expected something equal or better than TAXI DRIVER after that film either. It’s invigorating to see established filmmakers better their own high marks.
Setting a somber contemplative tone is a voice over from Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones, THE FUGITIVE), who tells a tale of killer who knows he’s going to hell and doesn’t care. Bell has seen a great deal of violence during his career and it is making less and less sense to him. Soon he will be swept up in a manhunt pitting a quiet laborer against a heartless professional killer.
During a hunt in the desert, Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin, GRINDHOUSE) walks up upon a grisly scene — a drug deal has gone awry and corpses lie everywhere. He finds a case with $2 million inside, which puts him in the crosshairs of many unsavory characters. Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem, THE SEA INSIDE) is #1 on that list. He uses an air-powered piston, like they use to slaughter cattle, to kill his victims without leaving behind evidence. It also serves as a quick way to deal with locked doors. For him murder is nothing, he’ll do so on a whim. Moss is a good and capable man, but he doesn’t know what he is up against. However, he soon gets a good idea, sending his loving wife Carla Jean (Kelly Macdonald, TWO FAMILY HOUSE) to stay with her mother. Yet, this won’t stop the killers from coming, which includes Carson Wells (Woody Harrelson, NATURAL BORN KILLERS), who is hired to get to the money before Chigurh.
Joel and Ethan Coen impeccably adapt Cormac McCarthy’s novel, creating great depth, intelligence and tension. With precise patience, they know just how to set up a moment to maximize its affect. Character moments not only help develop the roles, but also help increase the apprehension we feel when the action sequences come. Story, character and theme are all one. In this grand meditation on life and death, what Sheriff Bell is really struggling with is the randomness of existence.
Bardem creates a truly terrifying villain. Somehow he is able to create a completely remorseless killer who feels human. He’s not a boogieman, but he’s the real life killer that the boogieman is based on. He is so frighteningly good at what he does, we fear for Moss’s life with just the possibility that Churgh may find him. Brolin is having a standout year with his best work coming in this production. In this laconic role, he needs to nail each line of dialogue because it usually is meant to work on many levels and speak a great deal about his motivations. Jones, as the veteran cop, brings the same weathered wisdom he brought to his role in THE THREE BURIALS OF MELQUIADES ESTRADA. He is key to the story, because he is our eyes into the world, as well as our window into the deeper meaning the Coen’s are trying to address.
The resolution of this story isn’t clean, but that’s life I guess. There’s a big twist that sets the film in a new direction, ending with what some have unjustly compared to the abrupt ending to THE SOPRANOS or John Sayles’ LIMBO. If one keeps in mind that Bell is really the protagonist and that the other events are what spurs his decisions in life then you will understand why the film ends where it does, feel more satisfied and enjoy the questions about life and human nature the Coens are presenting more deeply. Keeping the title in mind toward the end also helps.
Most UN-satifying movie experience. Have seem something like this done better in Fargo. It leaves a lot of loose ends, does not follow through with the characters (lead character dies unexpectedly with no followup on that). Left a lot of sour taste in the mouth. Most of the time it was slow. And the last hope, the Sherif, quits his job and ends the movie while talking about his dream…. Yawwwn. If the book ends this way then I don’t think much of the book either. After investing more than an hour of your life following the characters and not getting any satifactory result is a shame. Definitely nothing to write home about.
You’re not the first person I have heard complain about the ending of this movie. The Coen Bros. took great risks indeed to end their movie in a way that was completely unexpected. It doesn’t pay off with the big shoot out between the good guy and the bad guy. Below I’m going to go into it a little more so for those who haven’t seen the film here is a SPOILER WARNING.
You’re right the central character does get killed quite suddenly. But was Janet Leigh’s untimely demise around the halfway mark of PSYCHO unsatisfying? What NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN gives us is a central character in Llewelyn Moss and a main character in Sheriff Ed Tom Bell. I look at this film in the same way as I do SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION where Tim Robbins’ Andy Dufresne is the central character, but the story ends up being the character arch of Morgan Freeman’s narrator Red.
NO COUNTRY starts with Bell’s voice over about a senseless murder that has haunted him his whole career. The title of the film refers to Bell not Moss. After Moss is killed, Bell visits his brother, who talks about how the world has always been brutal and that the only reason Ed perceives it as being worse is that he no longer has the stomach for it. The emotional toll that the Moss case puts on Bell spurs him to retire. Bell can no longer make sense of senseless death anymore.
As for the cat and mouse chase that Moss plays with Anton Chigurh, it’s the same cat and mouse chase that we all play with death. The scene were Chigurh taunts the gas station owner with the flip of the coin and at the end when Chigurh gets into the car accident just underscore the randomness of life and death. We don’t know when our last day will be. If the crazed assassin doesn’t get us, it might be the Mexican drug dealers. And it doesn’t matter whether we are good or bad, death eventually comes for us all whether we are ready for it or not and we cannot plead to the grim reaper to spare us.
NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN gives us two films in one — the tragedy of Llewelyn Moss, who doesn’t get to die like a hero as the movies have led us to believe all good men in these situations deserve if they don’t succeed, and Ed Tom Bell, who is plagued by survivor’s remorse and his inability to stop death. In life, as in the film, you either have to accept the chaos of living or retire.
SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION is one of my all time favorite movies. It was captivating throughout. I love movies and I like a movie with a bit of substance and not just shoot ‘em up action. But even protraying real life in a thought provoking manner takes some skill. Perhaps the demise of the central character suddenly is not that consequential but the movie on the whole felt like a road leading no where. The portrayal of evil in Anton, has been done in numerous films and to the same or better effect. So nothing new there.
Perhaps there is too much to read between the lines and for an average joe that just doesn’t make any sense. Everyone in the theatre had the same look and I heard asking what had just happened on screen. The only points would be for the cinematography.
So we have finally come to an agreement on something when it comes to this film. The cinematography is remarkable.
However, I found it curious that you felt throughout the film that it was going nowhere. For the most part, it plays out like any thriller does — a cat and mouse chase between the hero and the villain. The masterfully paced scenes in the motel and the hotel played out with tension equal to that of a Hitchcock thriller. Only in the end does the film change directions.
I find it surprising that so many viewers complain there is no more originality in films today, but reject films that do not end in the typical way. I believe the uneasiness that you felt at the end of this film, like things didn’t come together, is exactly what the Coen Bros. wanted.
The film is about the randomness of life and death. You have invested an entire film caring about what happens to Moss and then he dies in an unceremonious way. On an emotional level, it affects us in an uncommon way for film. We say, “hey, wait, that’s not fair” or “hey, you’re cheating.” The Coens are reminding us of the expression “life’s not fair.” Most films portray the world the way we wish it were, but brave films portray the world the way it really is.