Heart-stopping Chase Drama Inhabited by Lived-In Characters and a Plot Focused on Accountability

Rating: 8/10 (13 January 2008)

The unpredictable storytelling route at the heart of this intensely driven and thickly plotted 2007 film is what makes the ride a fascinating, often involving one. I had never read the acclaimed 2005 novel by author Cormac McCarthy, the basis of the film, but it's obvious that the story ambiguities, philosophizing tone and eccentric side characters were key draws for the idiosyncratic Coen brothers, Ethan and Joel, who again wrote and directed together as a team. Immediately familiar are the dark sensibilities that make an arid-looking West Texas a most unlikely place for a noir-type thriller, but the Coens' rich sense of character and place are certainly evident. At the same time, the relentless chase in the movie is so dominant that there is little time for them to showcase the quirky sense of humor that makes 1996's "Fargo" a modern classic. There are a few refreshingly amusing moments here and there, especially those involving the sheriff, but I have to admit that the lurid, heart-stopping scenes are what sear in my memory.
Set around 1980 (a point that isn't that clear until there is mention of Vietnam) near the Mexican border, Llewelyn Moss is out hunting in the sagebrush and comes upon the bloody aftermath of a failed drug deal. In the back of a pickup truck are a sizable payload of heroin and two million dollars. He makes off with the money, but through an act of unexpected and belated conscience, he becomes a man on the run by a number of different parties. Chief among them is Anton Chigurh, an unconscionable hit-man who escapes local police custody and closes in on Moss with unfettered conviction and unnerving calm. Surrounding both men is soon-to-retire Sheriff Ed Tom Bell, whose county is where the initial crime scene occurs. The characters' fates collide as the plot twists and turns, but the focus becomes less on the storyline and more on how they bring on their own dire situations through their own machinations. Given how the Coens end the movie (which apparently mirrors McCarthy's book) and some holes in the plot, the movie gains its emotional resonance as a tale of self-accountability.
The performances of the three leads are excellent. Sporting a hideous mop-top haircut, the versatile Javier Bardem manages to play Chigurh as the heartless killer he is by emphasizing the warped sense of honor that makes his acts reasonable to him. His manner is so discomforting that I was conflicted as to whether I should cringe vulnerably or avert my eyes entirely every time Chigurh shows up on the screen. Cast perfectly to type as the laconic Bell, Tommy Lee Jones is an assuring presence despite the drug-trading malevolence engulfing his territory, a development that makes his character realize that he has become a man out of his time (thus the movie's title). Usually a journeyman actor (with a famous wife, Diane Lane, and an even more famous mother-in-law), Josh Brolin conveys the precarious balance between opportunistic and decent with minimum fuss. As his worried wife Clara Jean, Kelly MacDonald has just a few effective scenes, and her final one attains a becalming power. The only fly in the ointment is Woody Harrelson, just too familiar a presence to be entirely convincing as a talkative bounty hunter who would be a compelling match for Chigurh. Of special note is Roger Deakins' masterful cinematography, which perfectly captures the rural setting.