Three men in the desert and some guys wonder why

Rating: 9/10 (21 August 2011)

Many people did complain about the sudden ending of the movie or wondered about the question about what it is all about. In fact, "No Country for Old Men" is this kind of motion picture you cannot change anything without ruining everything.
The film begins with the desert landscape and the voice of Sheriff Bell/Tommy Lee Jones. Sometimes it reminds me to the great works of writer William Faulkner and I never thought that a movie witch such an "simple" beginning could raise such an epic feeling from its first phrase. But maybe that is the best way to describe this Coen brothers picture with just one word: epic.
The story is well known and it is not the job of this review to tell it one more time and for all who know what is going to happen: Did you recognize that the three actors are never ever at the same moment in a shot? Brolin, Bardem and Jones? We never see them together, although one man is hunting the other. That is a fine aspect of the suspense and I do not remember right now any other film with the same situation. A movie about a man-hunt and no one can get away, while still no one gets the other one. Different than in the Hitchcock movies, the hunted is not an innocent person, who is totally over strained. Moss is a war veteran and although he has probably no idea about all this, no idea in what kind of s..t is getting into, he seems to know how tu survive or in better words: How to fight.
The way the Coens are showing us the faces of their characters is quit astonishing. Chigurgh is some kind of nobody. We do not know anything about him, but for all that we get introduced to his moral codex or his view of the world. Javier Bardem's acting performance and his presence is as schocking and haunting as Anthony Hopkin's Hannibal Lecter in "Silence of the Lambs" or Robert Mitchum in "Night of the Hunter". Make way for this guy or rent a grave.
The directing job of the Coen brothers is truly amazing. Suspense and tension have not been so fine since Jonathan Demme's "Silence of the Lambs" or Hitchcock's "Psycho". Exspecially the scene, when Moss is awaiting Chigurgh's attack in his motel room. We do not need to see how the killer is arriving. We saw it once before in this first motel, when Chigurgh killed all the Mexicans, while Moss escaped. The second attack is more thrilling, because we know that Chigurgh is in the house, we can almost feel him. We feel him and his presence. It is surrounded by danger and death. In his near you have always the fear that the guy, who is talking to him says something wrong, like the proprietor. Did he know how near he was to be murdered? Definitely not, but we know it and during the whole scene we await Chigurgh's attack and the final mistake. But the coin decided against Chigurgh and we can stop to held our breath.
I have always been a loyal fan of the Coen brothers. They are individualists and I like and honor that, because filmmakers need to be unique in their directing style. Joel and Ethan Coen always fill up their movies with some "crazy stuff" like the two gangster characters in "Fargo". I loved "Fargo" since the first time I watched and I never thought that the Coen brothers could do something better than "Fargo". You know, Quentin Tarantino never did something better than "Pulp Fiction" or "Reservoir Dogs". He never reached this high level again, although he is still making great movies. The Coens improved themselves. They created an epic and won three Oscars in one night. Now I wonder, if "No Country for Old Men" is the ultimate Coen brothers movie. Oui ou no? Heads or tails?
Finally, "No Country for Old Men" is as fine as a motion picture can be. The work of the crew is fabulous and it is exactly this kind of motion picture the business needs today. Creativ, astonishing, baffling and haunting and moving. And if you want to interpret it, you can fill a whole book.