No Country is a master class in film making. Name me an element of cinema technique and I would wager that No Country has mutiple scenes that would serve as perfect examples of that element.
It is set in small town Texas. The plot is the same as all the other Coen movies. A good guy finds a bag of money, he get's himself in a situation he can't get out of.
I have to say that this is the toughest review I have had to write so far. I don't want to say anything about the film, because I remember my first view and the thrill of discovering it. Also I have a tendency to rant about this movie. I could go on for hours bestowing it's virtues.
No Country is based off a Cormac MCCarthy novel. It is bleak and has furious moments of violence. It also has one of the greatest villains of all time: Anton Chigurh played by Javier Bardem. He is cold and sadistic. His weapon of choice is a cattle gun. An air driven piston into the forehead of his unsuspecting victims. What makes Chigurh so memeroable is that while being a cold blooded killer, he seems to take no pleasure in it. It was simply part of his job. He seems to live by a code. Not a traditional code of ethics, but an A moral code. He would often flip a coin to see if someone was going to die or not. He would always make his prey "call it". This spoke to both his refusal to break his code, and the futility and illusion of control over your life. The next closest thing is The Joker from The Dark Knight.
Josh Brolin is Moss. A Vietnam vet that is just trying to right by himself and his family. He stumbles on a good deal of cash from a drug sale gone wrong. He is running the entire movie trying to stay one step ahead of Chigurh. Tommy Lee Jones gives a wonderful performance. He is the well weathered Texas Sherrif that has pretty much resigned to waiting out retirement. He still loves the job and he is damn good at it, but he sees the future. He sees all the chaos and madness in the world and he doesn't know what to do about it.
These three characters make up a trio of marvelous story lines. The father, the son and the holly ghost is one I have heard kicked around. I then to think of them as symbols of "The Past" (Jones), the present (Brolin) and the future (Bardem). It is a movie with a bleak outlook for sure.
Another talking point is the ending. Don't worry I am not going to spoil it for you. Many would say that there is nothing to spoil because the end doesn't make any sense at all. I couldn't disagree more. I wouldn't change a single frame in the entire movie. This movie is a perfect 10 for Direction, Cinematography, Writing, Acting, Story, Setting, Sound (almost no music is heard at all), Costumes and Makeup. It is a perfect film that builds suspence like an any build it's home. Slowly but diligently. I give this movie a 5/5 stars. For more check out the link below for the trailer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBqmKSAHc6w
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