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*** May contain spoilers ***
Mesmerising thriller that see,s the Coen brothers back on top form
Northernsky from ,
28th January, 2008
It’s good to see the Coen brothers dealing with material they are comfortable with after the mis-step that was “The Ladykillers” Here they adapt Cormac McCarthy’s novel and it brings to mind two of their real triumphs -”Blood Simple “ And “Fargo” in that they are stripped down thrillers .Like “Blood Simple” this is set in a small Texan town and like “Fargo” it has one character as it’s moral centre , wondering what the hell the world is coming to as chaos and death swirl around him. Its 1980 and Vietnam vet Llewellyn Moss ( Josh Brolin) is out hunting in the Texan desert when he comes across the scene of a drugs deal gone wrong. There are trucks and bodies everywhere and one of the trucks is loaded to the gills with drugs. He finds a survivor who asks him for water but then comes across a set of tracks and blood stains leading away from the scene. Moss follows the trail finding a body and a suitcase full of cash. Taking the money back to the trailer he shares with his wife Carla Jean ( Kelly McDonald) he then makes a massive mistake. Riddled with guilt about the survivor he heads back to the desert to give him water only to find he has died and worse someone else has returned to the scene and don’t seem to pleased about him being there, and just to exacerbate his predicament they have found his vehicle and can therefore trace him. Of even greater concern as if this wasn’t enough is the suitcase contains a transponder and the man tracking him down is relentless psychopath Anton Chigurh(Javier Bardem), a man sporting a disturbing haircut , a pneumatic air gun and a propensity for deciding whether people live or die with the toss of a coin. On the other side of the moral divide is Sherriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones), a man nearing retirement and baffled by the escalating carnage around him. Moss thinks he’s smart enough to outwit Chigurh and as the bodies pile up the two indulge in an escalating cat and mouse game into which also steps the more reasonable hit man Carson Wells(Woody Harrelson).Meanwhile Sheriff Bell is always a step behind and also realises that Carla Jean may just be the key to bringing in Moss and stopping the killing. The pairing of McCarthy and the Coen,s works a treat. His stripped down and dry dialogue dovetails well with that of the Coens, fitting in with their dust dry humour ( When his deputy observes that the drug battle scene is a mess Bell reply’s “Well if it isn’t it’ll do till one gets here”) and they seem able to get a credible handle on his characters. In that they are aided by some admirable performances with Brolin, Jones, and Kelly McDonald( Her Texan accent is very convincing ) but its Javier Bardem as Chigurh who really stands out. By slightly reining in his performance as the inexorable killing machine Bardem makes him far more sinister and believable. His cold calculating manner is eerily credible but he is also someone who as Wells points out “He’s not like you, he’s not even like me“. When Bardem is on screen I guarantee you will not look away and will hang on every word. Like most truly outstanding cinema the Coens brothers film has things going on way beyond what you may see on the screen. It’s a film about the capriciousness of fate, about how tiny choices can have devasting consequences. Some see Chigurh as the human embodiment of death and there has been much postulating on events in the movie with several theories spinning around about Moss’s fate and even that of Bell . So even though it works wonderfully just as a pure thriller( You are genuinely never entirely certain which way any scene will go) No Country For Old Men is a far more potent work than that. The final scene lifted entirely from the book has Bell reciting a monologue that if anything shrouds the film and it’s conclusion in even more doubt and fog. Whatever your opinion of the films themes and the fate of the characters one thing cannot be denied. No Country For Old Men is exemplary film making .If there is a better movie released in 2008 we will have been blessed…..fate this time , will have been on our side.
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