A Film That Will Keep You on the Edge of Your Seat

Rating: 9/10 (13 September 2010)

The suspense, western, drama No Country for Old Men is directed by the Coen brothers and stars Josh Brolin, Javier Bardem, and Tommy Lee Jones. The film takes place in 1980 Texas.
The film starts off with a man, Anton Chigurh (Bardem), being arrested. He is then brought to the police station and the officer who arrested him is on the phone. He is able to get his handcuffs under his legs and then brutally strangles the officer to death and frees himself, steals a police car, kills another person and steals their car. Then it cuts to Llewelyn Moss (Brolin) hunting deer. While checking to see if he hits one he notices an arranged of vehicles in a field. He goes over and sees that there has been a large gunfight and finds a lot of drugs in the back of one of the trucks. Soon he finds a satchel that contains two million dollars inside of it. The rest of the film is about how Moss tries to make it away with the money while being chased by Chigurh and while Chigurh is being chased by a local sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Jones).
The screenplay for this film was excellent. It was extremely suspenseful and all the main characters had great depth to them. Anton Chigurh will be a character like Travis Bickle from Taxi Driver that will be remembered for a very long time. Also I thought the ending was very deep, along with the rest of the film. Personally it is my favorite Coen brother film I have seen, but I still have to see a good amount of their films.
The direction of this film was excellent and it well deserved the Oscar for it. To make a film this suspenseful without the use of music is extremely difficult and the Coens pull it off brilliantly. It is an edge of your seat film for the older generation, not just for the teens like most of the suspense films that come out these days. The Coens have proved yet again that they can get brilliant performances out of their actors. Truly an amazing job in the direction department.
The acting for this film was as well brilliant. Josh Brolin played the lead and it truly brought him to now become one of the biggest actors in Hollywood. He was a stubborn Texas man that just wasn't going to quit and he was absolutely perfect. Javier Bardem delivered one of the greatest performances of the decade in his role and will go down in history for it. He deserved that Oscar so much that they shouldn't have even nominated anyone else in the category. Jones played his part fine, it just seems that he is a police officer in every movie and it is pretty annoying. This is an excellently acted film.
Overall I give this film a 9/10, and I have no complaints with it winning the Best Picture Oscar, even though I like There Will be Blood more. I would recommend this one for anyone who likes great suspense films.