Classic Write-Up: No Country For Old Men Review

You're Not Ready For What's Coming

This review contains Spoilers

Texas is a state that seems to be constantly at war with itself. There are cities of course, hustling and bustling metropolises overflowing with activity. Yet, the state is so big that there's a wider array of terrain than just cities. Sometimes there's old-timey towns that seem to have been sent from the year 1957. Others are emtpy vistas of sand and rubble. Where I live in Texas is predominantly business driven, with a Wal-Mart or such stores around every corner. But the ideals of the folks certainly do seem old-fashioned at times, which makes for a fascinating paradox. And really, what better state to set a tale like No Country For Old Men depicting universal thoughts of humanity than in a state that is a relentless quandary?

A lot of little aspects that are a part of this movie seem so inconsequential on their own, but within the movie, they truly just blew me away. The level of thought given to these characters, the symbolism, the silence....oh man, the silence. I'd heard that was a part of this film, but I had no idea it was this prominent, nor that it was this effective. That silence just makes the movie for me, ramping every tension filled scenario to it's nail biting apex. Something like silence occurs every day in our lives, but within this film, it becomes so much more than that.

No Country For Old Men is primarily driven by the age old fear of the future we as people carry our entire lives. It's a ridiculous fear; after all, the future always, as Hobbes the Tiger perfectly said, turns into the present. And as I myself say to that thoughtful truth, isn't it the present that we're worried will be destroyed by the future? The present is comforting, as someone with Aspergers Syndrome, I can assure you, routine, designated schedules and what currently is are truly wonderful things. But we need the future. It's a good thing. But from our vantage point, the future is an unknown entity, something with no positive aspects or silver linings to speak of. From our earliest days as cavemen, man was predisposed to hate the unknown, and something as looming and terrifying as the future is the ultimate unknown.

Javier Bardem embodies the future as Anton Chigurh. Oh my God, what a terrifying creature. From the get-go, he has no backstory, and he doesn't need one. Like Heath Ledgers Joker, Bardem and The Coen Brothers get that every savage killing commits is far more powerful than anything else. Nothing else in this universe is capable of dealing with him, and it's that realization that may be more horrifying than anything else. The future can and will bring things both good and bad, but from a viewpoint in the present, the future will only bring change, and isn't change something we dread? Bardem makes sure Chigurh represents the future as we see it coming; something not to be understood or stopped, but something we fear with not a single redeeming quality in it. Like the depiction of the future we concoct while awaiting it, Chugurh is coming. And he will do what he does, no matter what.

But man does not go down so easily. As Breaking Bad showed so perfectly, some just have to have control over what they cannot control. And so, Llewellyn Moss comes to embody that method. In appearance, he seems to resemble an old Western hero, his cowboy hat perched on his head, facial hair above his lip and few words escaping his mouth. He thinks he can handle the consequences that come with taking the money, but his attempts to escape the future just are futile. Josh Brolin does a marvelous job at conveying pain underneath Moss's confidence, even as things spiral out to a wretched degree.

And then there's Tommy Lee Jones as Ed Tom Bell. He doesn't fight the future, but as he notes in one of the films final scenes, he hoped God would help in his older years, make things more certain. Throughout the movie, he engages in conversations talking about how much things have changed. One exchange he has at a diner late in the picture concerns the changing fashion trends he or his companion couldn't see coming. They complain about it, but Bell gets that the future is inevitable. The actual future is not like Chigurh; it has promising aspects to go with its scary ones. But that doesn't stop that madman from exacting revenge for reasons we don't get or need. He kills Moss off-screen, the imagination of what went down just running through my head constantly after seeing it.

I was wondering what the point of Jones was in this film, but good lord, when the demise of Moss arrives, it clicked for me. He's the spectator, the natural everyman. He too is frightened of the future, but he doesn't attempt to control it, he doesn't go to the extreme lengths Moss went through. He's also not a horrific madman like Chigurh. All Bell is is an older man who realizes the inevitability of the future and all that it brings. That doesn't mean we can't be frightened by it. On the contrary, the dreams Bell recalls at the end demonstrate that he, like all of us, share a fear of the future. A great fear in fact. But he also realizes fighting it won't result in anything meaningful. Tied with Roger Deakins spectacular cinematography, and the seriously phenomenal writing and director Joel and Ethan Coen deliver, this is a movie that truly deserves the term masterpiece. I'm honestly still reeling from this experience, and my God, the symbolism and thoughts it conveys are so fascinating, I doubt anyone could watch it and be impacted by its brilliance.