confusing

Rating: 6/10 (20 November 2007)

Let me say that I'm a Coen Brothers fan. Loved Fargo, Barton Fink, O Brother, Blood Simple. I enjoyed this movie for most of it, although to me it was a less successful film than Blood Simple which has a similar feel.
The big problem is the final act. The main character dies and it isn't even shown and is barely implied. I was confused in the theater when I saw it because I didn't know what happened to the Josh Brolin character. When the movie ended, several people in the audience were mumbling about the movie ending the way it did - inconclusively. The killer also kills the guy's wife at the end, but they don't bother to show that either. The sheriff has the bad guy cornered at one point in a hotel room, and the guy mysteriously disappears through an air vent.
The movie goes along and is setting up a confrontation between the two adversaries and instead of showing it, we get Tommy Lee Jones musing about life and how crazy the world has become. Then the killer wanders off at the end after a random car accident. The real problem is that you apparently need to read the book to know what happens in the film, which makes it an interesting failure in my mind.