2007 cat and mouse crime dramaRating: 18/20
Plot: A hunter with a woman's name and the shadow of a minor league hockey team mascot has lost his shooting touch. His focus is gone as he can think of nothing but his impotence. "It just doesn't work no more," he says to the sands and the clouds. He smells brownies and wanders into a Mexican picnic. Unfortunately, the eatin' has finished and the brownie supply is depleted. The Mexicans are sleeping, but one of them, a somnigrapher, doodles a sketch (or sketches a doodle depending on whom you ask) of a man with a terrible haircut and a Boy Scout sash tuning a piano. The sleep-writer scrawls, "Their [sic] guy take napping be side [sic] tree yonder. Check pant's [sic] 4 brownie lol!" and the hunter wanders to the only tree in this particular part of Texas to hopefully meet a reasonable man. The man gives him the last brownie, or at least the part that he has not yet eaten, but only on one condition--the hunter must transport his suitcase full of prawns to a place that is very far from where they currently were. The hunter agrees. A man with terrible hair, working desperately to earn his last Boy Scout badge before he reaches the age where Boy Scouts, according to the Boy Scout Code, are no longer allowed to earn badges, decides to help in order to get that treasured "Seafood Mobilization Badge" and be named "Boy Scout of the Century" by the Boy Scout Board of Boy Scouts. Ironically (or perhaps not ironically since I'm like most Americans and have no clue what that word even means), the hunter is terrified of bad haircuts and flees from the Boy Scout. The chase is on, the hotel bills are enormous, and the tension is thick as the characters wonder how long prawns will keep in a suitcase!
Brilliant. There was nothing I didn't like about what I was seeing on my television for two hours until the very end when there were some things that I didn't like seeing but then later realized that I actually liked those things, too. Jolted, amused, palpitating, and completely entertained, I watched this and was thrilled that it lived up to the hype. It's stylish without looking stylish--the tight and gritty action scenes, the nearly complete lack of music, those little details that the Coen brothers can draw attention to like no other directors. Great acting, and not just limited to Javier Bardem's role as a character that will never be forgotten. That Chigurh is a bad guy hard not to root for, a guy so completely evil and quizzical and tough and philosophical and mysterious and devastatingly original that you don't even feel guilty when you root for him. Such a cool story, and it moves along so quickly that you don't even realize the two hours have passed. Decidedly non-Hollywood, No Country for Old Men toys with expectations and hammers you with lessons deep and bleak. Brilliant. I can't wait to see it again.
Here I am enjoying No Country for Old Men:
This is a movie that changed my mood for a few days and which I thought about for weeks. It is an amazing piece of cinema with a dozen scenes that I will never forget. Unrelenting, dark, stylish and full of unforgettable characters, this has the feel of 'Fargo' to me, only even better. I keep wanting to read more into the movie than maybe was intended, and sadly, the Coen brothers won't come to my place to explain everything. Chigurh obviously seems to represent Death (you live only if you don't "see" him). Bardem has created one of the all-time great movie villians.
ReplyDeleteWhat I wonder is if the movie is a metaphor for our times. Moss (any of us) is a competent man who still is not ready for fate or what is coming in our society. When the worst comes, some may be able to step aside, retire and hide (Sheriff Bell), but can those people be content or happy.
Maybe I'm full of it, but 'No Country For Old men' is an extremely moving, shocking, entertaining chase film that feels like it could be saying much more under the surface. I also give it an 18.
I found it to be far less profound. It does have some great scenes, and classic moments, but thats all it ends up being for me..a movie of scenes and moments, rather than a movie that has something to say.
ReplyDeleteSome people like that, and others dont. I have much more respect for a movie thats willing to tell an entire story, rather than one that feels ambiguity is the way things are in real life.
Hey, if I want real life, I wont go to a movie to see it. I have real life every day.
You know what it is for me? Its the movie Contact....that Jodie Foster piece of crap from about a decade ago. That movie asked the big questions, then copped out on answering them. "Oh you need to answer those questions for yourself."....goddamn I hate that crap...Well here is what I know, I can ask those questions without some filmmakers help. Make a stand, and give YOUR answer, dont expect me to pay to do it for you. Even if that answer sucks or is stupid, at least you are making an attempt.
This movie, and the most recent Coen brothers movie (Which I avoid saying the name of now...it angers me so much.) have that exact same problem...laziness. Instead of coming up with an ending, they decide that they will be "deep" and let you do it for them. Its just garbage....and there is nothing that is going to change my mind on that. I honestly think its pure pretentiousness and no artistic or creative skill is needed to do it.
A 14 for No Country......and if I keep talking about it, it will drop.
Oh and Contact gets a 6...and a Serious Man would get negative numbers now if I could think straight.
I think that's pretty extreme, Barry. Sheriff Bell is no longer able to understand where the world is going. Death has passed him by and he survived this storm, but he doesn't want to be a part of the game anymore.
ReplyDeleteI don't think there is anything lazy about this film. It is as tense and dark as any film I have seen, and it richly deserved best picture. Two of five people you personally know hate it, as Kelly also thinks it is great. It is in my top 150 movies and I would now give it a 19.
I'm in the mood to see this again. Jen's not seen it. I will say that I understand where Barry's coming from. I heard the same argument from somebody else (and the same argument from Barry about 'A Serious Man,' a movie whose title I will type proudly), and I can understand how what should be the climax of the movie would be frustrating. I like the way the Coens toy with movie-goer expectations with this one.
ReplyDeleteHmm. I said pretty much the same exact thing in the original write-up. I need a thesaurus or something.
ReplyDeleteOh, and Cory...was the question that I couldn't answer the one about the movie being a "metaphor for our times" or are you referring to something else? If it's that, then yeah, I can't answer. Maybe I'll rewatch with that question in my head.