Right this blog appears to be definitely turning into something of a review blog, but at least the reviews have got a bit of variety, different films, bit of tv, bit of theatre maybe coming up at some point. So here is another movie review post, and its another Cohen brothers film, and not only that, it could well possibly be my favourite Cohen brother's film, the highly acclaimed No country for old men, based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy, so let's have a look at her. So just to warn you all, PLOT SPOILERS ABOUND!!
Starting with my usual obligatory dissection of the plot, the film is set out in Odessa Texas back in the June of 1980, where a local hunts-man and former Nam veteran, Lewellyn Moss (Josh Brolin) hunting for deer out in the open country, stumbles across several dead men, who appeared to have been involved in a gunfight. Moss while scouting the scene he finds an injured man in one of the trucks, who begs for water in a foreign tounge (turns out he's Mexican), but Moss says he has none and take the man's gun and ammo. Looking in the back of the truck he sees there is a massive quantity of drugs, and Moss soon comes across another dead man, who lies next to a suitcase, which is filled with money. Moss takes the case back to his trailer, where his wife Carla Jean (Kelly MacDonald) asks where he has been. Later that night Moss, out of guilt, decides to go back to the scene with water for the injured man in the truck, but when he get's there the man is nowhere to be seen, and all of a sudden a truck drives up, full of a gang of Mexicans, who bear down on Moss, who flees. Moss barely escapes the Mexicans, and makes it back to his trailer, where he warns Carla to pack her bags and to stay with her mother, and Moss leaves with the suitcase of money and heads to a motel in the next county.
In the meantime, a hitman, Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem), escapes police custody, by killing a police officer, and he later kills a driver, with a captive bolt pistol (used for killing cattle). Chigurh makes his way out to the crime scene in the open country where the drug deal was, with the help of two associates, he finds a receiver, which he uses to track the suticase, Chigurh then kills the two men, and drives off, having found the licence plate of Moss's abandoned truck, he tracks down the location of Moss's trailer. Chigurh then uses the receiver to track the whereabouts of the case, while in the meantime, Moss staying a motel, hides the money in an air vent between two of the motel rooms. Chigurh soon finds Moss's whereabouts with the receiver, and he ambushes the motel room, where he thinks Moss is staying, but finds three Mexicans instead, and he kills them all. Moss having heard the commotion in the next room, escapes the scene with the money, and goes to another motel. Chigurh soon follows Moss again and finally locates him at another motel, where it soon dawns on Moss that the case must have a way of being tracked, he looks inside and finds a transponder, but before he can leave, Chigurh shoots at him, with Moss once again barely fleeing with his life, he runs out onto the streets, and Moss succeds in shooting Chigurh in the leg with his shotgun, but Chigurh manages to escape before Moss finds him. Moss having been shot in the side, barely makes it across into the Mexican border, before he does, he tosses the suitcase over a fence into a field.
Soon after this, the man who hired Chigurh, an associate of a firm (played by Stephen Root), hires another hitman, Carson Wells (Woody Harrelson), in order to try and recover the money, after realising Chigurh is a loose canon. Wells manages to find Moss, who by now has been treated at a local hospital across the border, where Wells offers Moss protection in return for the money. Wells however is soon intercepted by Chigurh who kills him, at this point Moss calls Well's hotel room, but Chigurh answers and offers to make a deal, in return if he gives him the money, he will let his wife go, but he can't save himself, however Moss turns him down. After this Moss's wife, Carla Jean, and her mother (Beth Grant), arrange to rendevous with Moss at a motel in El Paso, but Carla Jean's mother, unwittingly blabs to one of the Mexicans, who locates them, the whereabouts of Moss, and they soon ambush Moss, killing him.
The local sherrif, Ed Tom (Tommy Lee Jones) whom Carla Jean has confided in the whereabouts of her husband, finds Moss in the motel room and he informs Carla Jean, and he makes a somewhat futile attempt at the crime scene to find any clues to what happened (with Chigurh hiding behind the door of an adjacent room). Soon after Ed Tom decides to retire from his position, feeling outmatched in his job, and powerless to make a difference. Meanwhile Carla Jean's mother passes away from ill health, as she returns to her mother's home, she finds Chigurh waiting for her....
It would be an understatement to say that No country for old men is a good film, and if anything it transcends pretty much anything the Cohen brothers have done before. The film itself has a different feel to any of their previous movies, and it feels like it is the perfect almalgamation of their talents, in both writing and direction. The film has a tremendous sense of dread and foreboding about it, and in this world there are no happy endings, and it shows the west to be a cruel and unrelenting place. Yet there is still the trademark humour the underlies most of the Cohen brothers films, with locals providing plenty of moments of amusement. One such scene is where Moss walks into a surplus store, where he bought guns and ammo from previously, except this time he is wearing a smock from hospital (and his cowboy boots), and he asks the store owner do you often see people come in here without any clothes, to which the owner replies "no, sir, its unusual!".
In terms of the performances, there is very little at fault here, as everyone is at the top of their game here. Josh Brolin for starters is excellent as Moss, who is basically just a normal guy, who is way out of his depth in the situation, but his former Vietnam veteran experience, just about keeps him alive long enough, before he meets his demise. Tommy Lee Jones, is also great as ever, as the police sherrif, Ed Tom, whom he plays with a dry wit, and a morose sense of acceptance about the violence that plagues the region, and he get's some of the film's best dialogue, which my favourite line is where his deputy says to him, when the investigate the scene of the drug deal gone wrong "Its a mess ain't it, sherrif?" and Ed Tom replies "well if it ain't, it'll do until the mess get's here". Woody Harrelson, although he has a shorter screen time than the others in the cast, is very good as Wells, and he too get's some fine dialogue, one of his lines I like is when Moss asks how he would describe Chigurh, and Wells replies "I would say he hasn't a sense humour". And in the unlikely casting of Kelly MacDonald, she also proves to be really good in her role as Carla Jean, Moss's worried wife, and you quickly forget that she is Scottish, when you hear her more than adequate Texan accent, and her scene with Chigurh at the end is a highlight.
But the film's best performance is without doubt from Javier Bardem as Anton Chigurh (who won the Oscar for best supporting actor), who you could almost say is like a human version of the Terminator, as he kills any one who stands in his way without any sense of remorse or conscience. Bardem's potrayal of the sociopathic hitman is exceptional, and he must rank as one of the most chilling antagonists in any film, with his cold blooded, and at times almost robotic responses. Chigurh clearly operates on a different plane from anyone else, and there are several scenes in the film that are highlights, particularly in the silent moments where he tracks down Moss, and has his gunfight with him on the streets, as well the scene where he blows up a car to create a diversion outside a local chemist, so he can steal some drugs to treat his wounds. And I can't forget to mention the absolutely chilling and suspensful scene where Chigurh has a conversation with a convenience store owner, who unwittingly has a very close call, when Chigurh asks him to make a call on a coin toss, that would determine his fate.
Direction wise, the Cohen brothers never put a foot wrong here, and they create a quiet but utterly intense atmosphere throughout the film, yet they still allow for a few moments of levity. And many of the films highlights come from the quiet scenes, with sparse dialogue, which makes them more suspenseful. Visually the film also looks stunning, with their regular cinema photographer, Roger Deakins, providing some spectacular scenes, particularly in the opening sequences out in the wide open region of Texas. And Carter Burwell also deserves mention, again the Cohen brother's regular composer, as he provides a very minimal score, with some intense passages, that add to the atmosphere of the film throughout.
On a slightly critical note, there has been some crticism from some viewers who thought that the film's ending left things unfinished, but if you look at the film again, it does pretty much tie up all the loose ends. The only one left at the end you could probably say is what happens to Chigurh is somewhat less clear, but I guess the Cohen brother's wanted to leave his fate ambiguous. You could also probably argue that Moss could have covered his tracks better than he did, by burning down his trailer for starters, so that way no one would ever have tracked him down, and that would have made things that bit more difficult for Chigurh to locate him. But with the unstoppable force that Chigurh is, you would have to wager he would have found a way.
So that's it for my review of No country for old men, which saw the Cohen brothers at the peak of their creative talent, and not only that they were also finally awarded with Academy awards for best picture, best direction and best adapted screenplay, which were totally merited (unlike some films that have won oscars I could mention!).
And well that is that.
No comments:
Post a Comment