*****POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD*****Gripping tale of a psychopathic killer has no ending...

Rating: 6/10 (25 October 2008)

I have to give NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN a very mixed review.
For the most part, I agree that NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN is a well executed crime drama, patterned somewhat after the much better written FARGO, in which the central character was a female officer. Here, it's a male sheriff (TOMMY LEE JONES) given to some armchair psychiatry aimed at trying to understand what makes today's western civilization (or lack of it) tick. He gets no answer from the script.
Nor do we get a satisfying ending to a story that is full of grim menace supplied by its main character (JAVIER BARDEM) who goes around dispensing with almost every member of the supporting cast.
Nor do the characters act in a way that makes common sense. This is the main trouble with the script. WOODY HARRELSON, for example, seems to walk meekly to his final destiny with the casual air of a man unalarmed by the situation after warning JOSH BROLIN (a man on the run) that he's up against a man who simply wants blood. Likewise, Brolin's wife accepts her fate meekly after stating that she "knew" the killer would show up on her doorstep.
It's taut with suspense most of the time with only a few spots that drag, but it's the inconsistencies of certain characters that gave the script some flaws, as well as a general lack of humor which made the dark happenings in FARGO more bearable.
The biggest letdown is the dry ending with no justice for the guilty man and Tommy Lee Jones describing a dream that has nothing to do with the events we just witnessed. Period. The End.
The very flat ending is the weakest part of all. But the performances of JAVIER BARDEM, TOMMY LEE JONES and especially JOSH BROLIN in a very unusual role for him, make the film eminently worth watching.