Darkness in the Heart of Texas
Josh Brolin, Javier Bardem, Tommy Lee Jones

By Breanne Boland November 29, 2007 Issue

No Country for Old Men uses startlingly brutal acts to explore the meaning and meaninglessness of violence. Set in Texas in 1980, the film brings cowboy-esque resourcefulness and resolve to more modern times with jarring and thought-provoking results.

On the surface, the film follows the ramifications of a drug deal gone terribly wrong. Josh Brolin plays a hunter who stumbles upon the remains of a drug-fueled shoot out. Rather than alerting the authorities, he pries a briefcase of money from the fingers of a dead man and brings it home, telling his young wife that they’re now retired. Anyone familiar with earlier works of the Coen brothers knows that the possession of a suitcase full of cash rarely brings glad tidings.

This film is no exception. Brolin’s theft gets the attention of an entire hierarchy of merciless men as the deal-gone-awry and the money’s disappearance become known. Brolin hits the road, but he’s entered a more ruthless world than the one he usually inhabits, and his best efforts can’t thwart the men now following him. Javier Bardem, abandoning his usual effortless warmth to become a psychopathic bounty hunter with a truly twisted moral code, plays the most frightening of these. His goal isn’t merely to retrieve the money; armed with a shotgun with a silencer, he seeks the slightest excuse to kill. And he does — often and horrifically. He dispatches final judgments so casually that he almost seems like a character from an especially bloodthirsty myth.

The Coen brothers are known for, among other things, clever observations of small-town folk and their subtle, twisted sense of humor. These aren’t entirely absent, but wry glee is pushed aside for the grim proceedings. The film uses the same visual and narrative vocabulary as in previous works, but with a different, bleaker approach.

Tommy Lee Jones plays off his past works in the same way. His capable good ole boy is present, but in a quieter, saddened way, as his long career as a cop has dulled any joie de vivre and left only a certain shell-shocked quality. He looks upon the trail of atrocities that leads us through the film and tries to pull meaning from it, from a world he feels is changing. However it’s impossible when following a killer like the one played by Bardem.

No Country for Old Men is an accomplishment, a thoughtful memorable novel of a film, taken faithfully from the book by Cormac McCarthy. The basic narrative itself is excuse enough to sit in a theater for two hours, but it’s the echoes and afterimages, which reveal how fine a film this really is. It’s disturbing while you view it, to be sure, but it’s the way it settles on your shoulders like a cold mantle that really demonstrates its power. Between the more sensationalist aspects of the media and everyday distrust for our fellow human beings, this film shouldn’t cut so deeply. For this film’s imagined violence to be so affecting, to hang in your thoughts for so long after leaving the theater, is a stunning testament to its makers’ skills.

Bottom line: well-done, artful pessimism

Coming Attractions
Nov. 30
Awake - When her husband (Hayden Christensen) experiences complications during heart surgery, Jessica Alba must decide what to do next. Trouble is he’s awake and aware the entire time due to being inadequately anesthetized.

Dec. 7
The Golden Compass - Based on the first book of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy, young Lyra finds herself tossed around a world of devious adults as she ventures through witches and polar bears to find her kidnapped best friend.

Atonement - A young girl frames her older sister’s boyfriend for a crime he didn’t commit, leading him to enlist during World War II. As the girl ages, she must deal with the repercussions of the injustice she created.

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