1243 No Country for Old Men

[Andre Jurieu]

I think there is a danger in simply always assuming that the Coens are being smug, smarmy, and egotistical and that they always snigger and feel superior to their characters.

This is the Ray Carney school of thought I think... a school I would not attend even if offered a full scholarship...

Sorry, I'm a bit slow today (more so than usual). Do you mean that Carney always assumes the Coens to be smug or that Carney thinks it's dangerous to assume the Coens always feel superior to their characters? I've always thought that Carney presumes the Coens to be egotistical jerks who treat their characters with contempt.

Truthfully, I've always wanted to sit in on one of his classes while he trains his zombies, just to see what it's like.

Of course, it's dangerous to talk smack about Carney around here. He just might show up again with all his acolytes yelling at us in CAP LOCKS!

[LeeB.Sims]

I was saying that Carney's theory on the Coens is precisely the stuff you are warning against. I agree with you that it is not a valid assumption. Has Carney really gotten on this board to defend himself before? I suppose if I wore a bowtie and my voice sounded like Minnie Mouse I would have a pretty low self-esteem too.

[pemmican]

The idea that somehow the Coen brothers are on the "side" of Frances McDormand in FARGO - as if it's all about their fondness for her simple virtue - is baffling to me, and seems to efface whatever is interesting about the film (which seems to be about people frustrated by "normal life" and trying desperately to escape, only to be beaten down and destroyed by comical, complacent, everyday mediocrity; it's actually a fairly interesting way of structuring a film, such that our desires and hopes are with the characters who WANT a better life, or feel they deserve it - Buscemi and Macy - while virtue and closure require them to be destroyed/subordinated... The scene with the Asian-American guy is fascinating, as well - how his own desire to step outside the confines of American mediocrity and speak what he feels has also to be crushed... It's the Coens most revealing film, in ways, though I can't say I enjoy it). There's a great recent Japanese take on the basic premise, by the way, called THE MATSUGANE POTSHOT AFFAIR - same guy who made LINDA LINDA LINDA...

Anyhow... as for the idea that the Coens have "profound reverence" for Bell - well, I just don't know how anyone GETS there from this film. Save for the final scenes, which DO work - the Coens seemed TO ME to be constantly amused by him; when, for instance, he's sharing his befuddlement or his codgerlike opinions with the young deputy, or discoursing on the case over lunch... I saw them as sniggering. Guess that's all I can say, don't know how I can demonstrate it if other people are reacting differently. I don't think I was predisposed to respond that way, though: if anything, I was hoping the film would NOT do that, even if I had my doubts...

No offense about the "suckered" line: in a way, I feel envy for those of you who were able to accept the depiction of Bell - it must have made this a fairly rewarding film experience. I'd rather ride with Rosenbaum and Carney on this one...

P.

[pemmican]

Not much I haven't already said - but I posted my review of the film here.

P.

[LeeB.Sims]

No offense about the "suckered" line: in a way, I feel envy for those of you who were able to accept the depiction of Bell - it must have made this a fairly rewarding film experience. I'd rather ride with Rosenbaum and Carney on this one...

This paragraph alone proves that you are much more mature and respectful of differing opinions than either Rosenbaum or Carney. Thank you for that.

[pemmican]

Carney I find maddening; I corresponded with him for awhile, have several of his self-published books (signed rather endearingly with phrases like "Go with God!" or "Fight for truth!"), and for awhile considered studying under him... but it's hard to defend some of what he does. I am almost able to deal with his rants about how mediocre everyone is and how our culture is ridden with crap - because a) I think there's a NEED for that kind of vitriol, b) he scores many good points about the sort of stuff that gets praised, and can actually stimulate thought and passion for authentic and challenging cinema, and c) (as the Criterion debacle should have shown him) he's surely going to hurt HIMSELF more than anyone else by his tendency to rage and namecall -- but it sure would help IF he also did things like make his version of Shadows available on the net (which he should have done YEARS ago), and if he DIDN'T do things like make this outrageous claim that he's discovered a lost Cassavetes film, which he won't tell the world about until he's good and ready (see his homepage - he's been dangling this for about a year). Ray Carney is willing to point fingers at everyone else's ego, but his own seems pretty damn sizeable, too - it's become a bit much.

Rosenbaum seems a bit more mature, I suppose - and I agree with a lot of what I've read him say, for example about the AFI Top 100, Miramax, or even certain Coen films (Barton Fink) - but he disgusted me by capitalizing on Bergman's death in "Scenes from an Overrated Career," which was in VERY poor taste, and I really do suspect he hates the Coens on PRINCIPLE. He didn't even really work that hard as a critic with No Country - his review dismisses the film for what it amounts to, rather than any specific flaws it may have, which is, really, kind of lazy - you get the feeling he hates the film BECAUSE the Coens made it, not because of HOW they made it. See the link above to my No Country review, I rant a bit about all this there.

P.

[Cold Bishop]

While I don't really want to get involved in this argument (which just feels like an agree-to-disagree situation to me), or throw any more superlatives on the film than there already is, all I'm gonna say is that this is the rare example where I feel a movie is better than the book (not to turn off Ehrenstein from reading McCarthy's other works), even rarer since its a practically ad-verbatim adaptation, something I usually disapprove of.

And for all the violence and evil incarnate throughout the film, the ending is one of the few things I've seen in film in a long while that I found genuinely unsettling.

[Joe Buck]

Really wish I could see this film. Regal too busy putting Fred Claus on 8 screens. I hate this town.

[Oedipax]

Something curious I just noticed in the November/December Film Comment with Javier Bardem on the cover - in the Critics' Choice section, Jonathan Rosenbaum is listed as giving No Country for Old Men four stars! Oops.

I had a chance to see an 'early' screening of this in Atlanta this past Tuesday and thought the film was great. It's in general release here now, so I'll probably see it again sometime this weekend.

[Nothing]

this is the rare example where I feel a movie is better than the book

NO COUNTRY may be a minor work, but McCarthy is still one of the greatest American authors of the past 50 years. The Coens are... pah.

[Poncho Punch]

Chigurh is one of the best three western villains of the last 2 years; Javier Bardem can't compete with Gene Hackman, Henry Fonda, Henry Brandon and John Wayne. Alfred A. Knopf is undoubtedly among the top five publishing companies now under the Random House banner; Miramax licks my balls. William Butler Yeats is my favorite Irish poet to work in the latter decade of the 19th century and the first few of the 20th; Cormac McCarthy wasn't even a twinkle in his papa's eye when Yeats was kicking ass and taking the Nobel Prize in Literature home.

[Cosmic Bus]

Really wish I could see this film. Regal too busy putting Fred Claus on 8 screens. I hate this town.

Took the words straight out of my mouth. I swear, Regal is the worst, particularly in awards season. Imagine my dismay (and complete lack of surprise) to see the release listings for this coming Wednesday: No Country is nowhere to be found, but hey, I can go see August Rush! Now that's Thanksgiving.

[Cold Bishop]

NO COUNTRY may be a minor work, but McCarthy is still one of the greatest American authors of the past 50 years. The Coens are... pah.

All this may be true... but the movie was still better than the book.

[jbeall]

Really wish I could see this film. Regal too busy putting Fred Claus on 8 screens. I hate this town.

Took the words straight out of my mouth. I swear, Regal is the worst, particularly in awards season. Imagine my dismay (and complete lack of surprise) to see the release listings for this coming Wednesday: No Country is nowhere to be found, but hey, I can go see August Rush! Now that's Thanksgiving.

No doubt. I was planning to see No Country last night, only to find out that it's not opening anywhere near me (well, there's NYC, but that's an hour-long train ride away). I can't stand having two mega-corporations that charge over $9 a ticket (with a student discount it's exactly $9) to see the same limited selection of movies. I got to see Dan in Real Life instead...

And it doesn't look like Regal or Loew's is getting it on the 21st, either. Fuckers.

[cinemartin]

Chigurh is one of the best three western villains of the last 2 years; Javier Bardem can't compete with Gene Hackman, Henry Fonda, Henry Brandon and John Wayne. Alfred A. Knopf is undoubtedly among the top five publishing companies now under the Random House banner; Miramax licks my balls. William Butler Yeats is my favorite Irish poet to work in the latter decade of the 19th century and the first few of the 20th; Cormac McCarthy wasn't even a twinkle in his papa's eye when Yeats was kicking ass and taking the Nobel Prize in Literature home.

I really don't understand what any of this means.

[tavernier]

I guess you missed the apples and oranges photos below his post.

[Mr Sausage]

Chigurh is one of the best three western villains of the last 2 years; Javier Bardem can't compete with Gene Hackman, Henry Fonda, Henry Brandon and John Wayne. Alfred A. Knopf is undoubtedly among the top five publishing companies now under the Random House banner; Miramax licks my balls. William Butler Yeats is my favorite Irish poet to work in the latter decade of the 19th century and the first few of the 20th; Cormac McCarthy wasn't even a twinkle in his papa's eye when Yeats was kicking ass and taking the Nobel Prize in Literature home.

I really don't understand what any of this means.

You'll notice the divergences get more and more arbitrary until finally William Butler Yeats pops his head into, seemingly, the wrong room altogether.

And speaking of him, Yeats hadn't even written his best book of poetry (The Tower) when he was given the Nobel prize.

[LeeB.Sims]

Just saw it this weekend. I don't even really know what to say about it at this point other than that I was not the slightest bit disappointed. Roger Deakins is the Jesus Christ of cinematography. Javier Bardem is the devil incarnate. Josh Brolin is so damn tough and resourceful he could make a box of rusty nails feel like goose down. Tommy Lee Jones is… well, he's Tommy Lee Jones. It was in my opinion the most restrained and calculated film the Coens have ever made. What was up with this: no music in the entire thing???… it was eerie.

There's quite a bit that's pure Coen - having Jones talk about slaughtering cattle, without him being intelligent enough to put together what this implies, for instance (though we do).
...

MAJOR SPOILER - don't proceed unless you've read the novel or seen the film, or are convinced you will do neither:

Chigurh's explanations for shooting the wife at the end are considerably richer in the book, and - while I can't replicate them here - they become immediately applicable to the car accident he is in just afterwards, since his philosophy has everything to do with chance and determinism. If you accept his worldview, his being nearly killed almost seems a divine punishment - or at the very least, a very dark joke at his expense, courtesy of the forces he believes he has learned to coexist with.

I couldn't respond to these points until I saw the film but I wanted to offer my own viewpoint on the complaints you pointed out above. For the first complaint, I got the impression that at that moment Jones' character actually did figure it out, but a)was restrained enough to not mention anything about his revelation in front of Brolin's wife, and b)it didn't really help him in his case to find Chigur, so he just filed it away with the other facts. It wasn't a really big break was it?

Regarding your spoiler paragraph: I haven't read the book, and I certainly was receptive to the implications of the scene. I understood exactly how his twisted moral code would convict him to take this action, and I thought it was superbly eloquent how the second event laid bare the incredible irony or these principals he lived by. In fact, I loved the ambiguity of this scene and lack of any gratuitous explanation.

This is just my two cents anyway, not trying to change anyone's mind of course. I thought it might be interesting to you to know that this vital element of the story was still present for someone who hadn't read the novel.

[HerrSchreck]

Roger Deakins is the Jesus Christ of cinematography..

...Karl Freund and John ALton are passing antacids around up in heaven.

[DrewReiber]

Regarding your spoiler paragraph: I haven't read the book, and I certainly was receptive to the implications of the scene. I understood exactly how his twisted moral code would convict him to take this action, and I thought it was superbly eloquent how the second event laid bare the incredible irony or these principals he lived by. In fact, I loved the ambiguity of this scene and lack of any gratuitous explanation.

Ditto. I also had not read the book and the alterations were only made apparent to me after I had seen the film. I was easily able to discern these important elements from the movie on it's own terms.

[pemmican]

Good to know, then. I guess that's one objection to the film I can cross off my list - but you really should check out the novel; Chigurh is much more articulate - he gets in your head in a very unsettling way. The film kind of does to the character what SILENCE OF THE LAMBS did to Hannibal Lecter...

P.

[Cold Bishop]

Good to know, then. I guess that's one objection to the film I can cross off my list - but you really should check out the novel; Chigurh is much more articulate - he gets in your head in a very unsettling way. The film kind of does to the character what SILENCE OF THE LAMBS did to Hannibal Lecter...

P.

While I agree that the book does draw out Chirgurh out a little more, and some of his speeches seem better done (I recall the scene with Carla Jean Moss being drawn out better), I'm not sure if its necessary to have it elaborated on for the film, and this goes along with a lot of the "it was better in the book" talk. I feel everything the book explicates about Chirgurh can be found or induced from the movie, and some could even make the "less is more" argument for Chirgurh in the film, that it helps create an even more mysterious and mythological force of evil by not having him articulate everything. I feel like this argument is like having a fantastic piece of cake, and having a fantastic piece of cake with a little extra icing. The extra icing is nice, but is it necessary? It's still a damn good piece of cake.

[Antoine Doinel]

The Coin Killer.

I'm not really sure what the point is in giving a movie like this such a tacky viral game.

[Nothing]

All this may be true... but the movie was still better than the book.

I've seen enough clips from the film (maybe 10 minutes or so) to know this isn't the case.

[Jeff]

All this may be true... but the movie was still better than the book.

I've seen enough clips from the film (maybe 10 minutes or so) to know this isn't the case.

Yeah. Nothing like seeing 8% of a movie to help you formulate an informed opinion of it.