Brilliant but flawed. The stunning tension peters out before the end

Rating: 8/10 (6 July 2008)

Whilst watching NCFOM, James Cameron's 'The Terminator' kept popping into my mind. On the surface, they have little in common, but the underlying themes are the same. Kyle Reese's character is replaced with Josh Brolin's; an out-gunned, but gritty and resilient fighter, resourceful but always on the back foot. Sarah Connor is played by a briefcase full of drug money; to be protected at all costs and Javier Bardem is the Terminator; the unstoppable juggernaut, a killing machine which can't be stopped or reasoned with; as we are often reminded by auxiliary characters in NCFOM.
Both films play out in much the same way, as the killer slowly closes in, the suspense mounts. And it's here that the Coen brothers excel themselves in creating an unfathomable amount of tension, delivering a master-class in direction and helped by superb performances from their two leads.
Two thirds of the way in, my heart was racing every time Bardem stepped onto screen, i was hanging on his every word and hoping that somehow - against all the obvious odds - our hero would prevail. And then it happens, the reason so many people voted this film a 1/10. Not because it's worth 1/10, but because they were totally unprepared for what happened next, and can't shake the bitter taste of such unconventional story telling from their mouths: We see Brolin's character dead, on the floor of a motel room, the Coen brothers take their lunch break and (i suspect) draft in David Lynch to finish the film off. It ambles its way to an underwhelming climax with abstract scenes and dialogue which you won't take in, because you'll be wondering what happened and when you get to see it. The answer is never.
I've heard the film is loyal to the book, but with a book, you imagine everything anyway, so it's a better medium to find your lead character already dead. Not so in films, i've paid my money, show me your vision, paint the story on the screen for my lazy brain. Had The Terminator ended with Sarah and Kyle dying off-screen and the terminator walking off into the distance i don't think we'd be talking about it nearly 25 years on. And we won't be talking about NCFOM in 25 years either. But it's worth a viewing if only to witness the greatest enactment of a psychopath since Anthony Hopkins' Hannibal Lector. 8/10