The Coens do it again.

Rating: 10/10 (12 July 2010)

"You can't stop what's coming. It ain't all waiting on you. That's vanity."
Even if No Country for Old Men didn't have gorgeous cinematography, excellent pacing, a near perfect script, and an absolutely perfect cast, I still would have loved it for its tone. It's the most similar movie to Fargo that the Coens have done, and the similar theme of implacable and unfathomable violence in a rural American area (once again initiated by money) is one of the main reasons why I love the Coens so much.
The breathtaking, empty setting of south Texas is a seamless compliment to the measured pace of the movie. No Country has suspense coming out of its ears, as each scene seems to somehow surpass the previous ones in measured tension. The overall quiet of the film only serves to magnify the eventual scenes of violence when they come, and the fact that you don't see everything happen on-screen keeps the viewer fully invested in the story. There's no constant quick cuts and hyper-kinetic camera work to be seen; only long-smoldering sequences that pushes your anticipation to the brink of breaking, and then pushes it some more.
In a cast this good, two people stand out even beyond the others. Tommy Lee Jones as the world-weary sheriff who's the heart of the story, and Javier Bardem as the relentless, inscrutable, main antagonist of the story. Jones was perfect, there's no other way for me to say it. And Bardem gives life to the best and most interesting villain since The Operative in Serenity. Both performances were among the best that I've seen in my life.
No County for Old Men is the kind of movie that improves with every viewing. Ten years from now, I'll still be watching it and loving it. It's film-making at its finest. When you take an amazing story and marry it to directors with immeasurable talent and a cast that couldn't have been better chosen, you get a masterpiece.