A Conversation with No Country for Old Men

You know the drill. I transform myself into a movie, and get interviewed by a guy who is named after my imaginary cat. Tonight I shall be No Country for Old Men, the 2007 Best Picture winner from the Coen Brothers which I finally got around to watching from start to end.

Before we begin - while we're on the subject of conversations, a conversation I had with fellow blogger Max made it on to Anomalous Material. This is the first of a new feature over at that awesome website!

C: I am here in the middle of nowhere with No Country for Old Men, an Academy Award winning feature.
N: Indeed I am an Academy Award winning feature. Hang on, did I say you could sit?

C: No, but you strike me as a man who wouldn't want to waste his chair.
N: It's not often you see a Mexican in a suit.

C: I'm not a Mexican...uh, okay, explain yourself...
N: I'm based on a very famous novel by Cormac McCarthy, which was adapted for the screen by the Coen Brothers, who happen to be very famous themselves. They made Fargo, The Big Lebowski, and that remake True Grit which was nominated for 10 Oscars but it did not win any of them. Ha, I laugh at it's misfortune.

C: Well, you yourself were only nominated for 8.

N: But I won 4! Including Best Picture. That meek little western couldn't even beat a movie about a guy who can't talk properly. Me? I beat that World War II love story, that one with the pregnant teenager that I could not understand as they talked funny, that one with George Clooney in it, and that one about the milkshake drinker. The secret to my success? Anton Chigurh killed them all.

C:  So you're saying that True Grit is simply inferior because it does not have Anton Chigurh?
N: Does Mattie Ross have a cattle gun? No. Does Rooster Cogburn have a bad haircut? No.

C: Basically, you think you are the best movie from the Coens.
N: One would assume so, yes.

C: Anyway, you did not explain yourself fully. I want plot details.
N: Well, some dumb-ass by the name of Llewelyn Moss comes across the remains of a drug deal gone wrong, where he also discovers $2 million. And what does a dumb-ass do when he comes across a stack of money? He takes it. That dumb-ass shouldn't have done that. Coz now Anton Chigurh, the most evil hitman with the most evil haircut ever, is after him. He won't stop until he gets that money back, even if that means killing everyone who comes into contact with him. Anton is a force that cannot be contained, not even by the law, which includes Ed Bell, who bitterly oversees these murders happening.

C: Sounds very intense.
N: Oh believe me, I'm one gritty, graphic and gripping movie.

C: Being a movie from the Coen Brothers, do you have a lot of wit like all of the others?

N: I'm your traditional Coens movie. Lots of witty dialogue, plenty of great characters, scenes that have been directed the hell out of, and, of course, beautiful cinematography by Roger Deakins. It must be worth mentioning that there is hardly any music in me, which is pretty darn odd for a thriller, yet I'm still completely engaging. I'm a rough and tough Coens masterpiece.

C: What about your performances, which include an Oscar winning turn from Javier Bardem?
N: The performances across the board are all brilliant. Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin and Kelly McDonald are all great, yes, but Javier Bardem is the real show stealer. What could be more scary than a man completely devoid of emotion, who drives around with a forceful weapon killing anyone who angers him slightly, and who believes that fate can be decided by a coin toss?

C: Does fate come down to a coin toss?
N: It depends. If you put your lucky quarter into your pocket, it'll get all mixed up with your other coins, and then it will become just a coin, which is what it is.

C: Well, it sure was nice chatting with you. Any last words for the readers out there?
N: People always say the same thing. They always say "You don't have to do this." But you really do. You really gotta watch me.

And my rating for No Country for Old Men:

Cinema - True Grit

or: How the West was wonderful.



One word to sum it up: Funny.

Westerns. Not one of my most treasured territories. Well, yeah, I've seen High Noon and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, but I highly doubt that that could qualify me as an expert on westerns. The Coens are another section of the film world which I don't feel too expertised on (yes, I just made up a word). I've only seen Burn After Reading and A Serious Man, films which I genuinely liked, but haven't quite gotten around to the classic Coens yet. So, based on my lack of knowledge of the two heaviest components of True Grit, I will have to base the following statement on my expectations of the two: True Grit is a bloody good western and a bloody good Coen film.

So how is it that the Coens could bring the western genre back to our screens, making it fit for a modern audience, so to speak? They give us a movie with Jeff Bridges + eyepatch, Matt Damon + lots of tassles and a young chick to blow our minds to pieces because she is so great at acting and she is so young. Their cast gets a damn good script, based more on the book by Charles Portis than the 1969 classic of the same name which scored John Wayne his only Oscar. We see the story through the eyes of old Mattie Ross (Elizabeth Marvel), who is recollecting her younger days when she was hunting down the killer of her father, as heard through her narration. 14 year old Mattie (Hailee Steinfeld) enlists the help of U.S Marshal Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to help her find a man named Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin), who killed her father and whom she wants revenge on. Before she embarks on her journey, she meets a Texas Ranger, LaBoeuf (Matt Damon), who wants Chaney for his own reasons. Now Mattie, Rooster and LaBoeuf form an unlikely trio to avenge Mattie's fathers death, obviously coming across some problems along the way.

Going in to True Grit, I thought I would be in for one of those gun slinging action flicks that have thrilling horse-and-cowboy fights happening all over the place. My prediction was quite wrong. While there are a lot of gun shots fired and a lot of people dying in this movie, but it's more a sharp witted drama than anything. The character development, on behalf of the actors and the script, is fantastic. The way they are able to make the characters stop and interact is something too rarely seen in modern movies. Given that there a lengthy patches of dialogue, True Grit moves along at a comfortable pace: not too caught up in being an action packed gun filled western and not too caught up in being the perfect film for just focussing on characters. The way the themes of revenge and retribution are intertwined within the characters is nice, but perhaps there isn't enough Tom Chaney to make us feel vengeful towards what he did, even though Mattie's point of view makes sure we hate him. Ultimately, this is a highly intelligent and very attentive to detail script that True Grit has going on.

The cinematography by Roger Deakins is another high point in True Grit. There are some absolute killer shots which perfectly fit my expectation of the western genre. Everything he shot was crafted by angels. The snow scenes were magical, the sunset scene was breath takingly beautiful, and individual close ups of the characters were precisely done. If I didn't know any better, I would say he is a strong contender for the cinematography award at the Oscars. To add to True Grit's beauty is some brilliant set design. Everything, down to the last board of wood, is perfect. The costume design by Mary Zophres, too, is great. While each character only has one costume to speak of, her designs are unparalleled in the way they seem to fit each character perfectly, e.g. Mattie has a very edgy but dull dress, because she is headstrong though not an extremely exciting young lass.

Now I've run you all into the ground by my non stop love for the character development, it must be time to conclude this slightly overcooked review with some notes on the performances, the best part of the film. If only Colin Firth could have won an Oscar for his performance in A Single Man last year and Jeff Bridges won for his performance in True Grit this year. Bridges adopts a very slow and slurred gravelly tone which is a little difficult to understand at times, but he is perfect as Rooster. He has the right blend of wit and utter cluelessness that makes him impossible not to enjoy. Matt Damon delivers a very understated performance as LaBoeuf, whose arrogance becomes an arrow of slight flamboyance. Josh Brolin is terrific as the villain Tom Chaney. Though you can't help but wonder when Brolin will stop playing the villain. But he's terrific at it, so I'll leave him to that. However, and many people have said it, Hailee Steinfeld is the standout here. Coming from a similar aged girl who dabbles in school drama classes, Steinfeld is bloody terrific for a fourteen year old. No, she is beyond amazing. I love how hard headed she is and how dedicated she is to the character, which is admittedly hard for a girl with little acting experience. If you were wanting to see True Grit, see it for her, because she steals the show.

THE VERDICT: True Grit is a masterpiece in terms of character development and bringing the western genre to a modern audience.

What I hoped for:

What I got:

DVD--Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

or: Sequels that come a long time after.

One word to sum it up: Disappointing.

23 years was all it took to bring Gordon Gekko back to our screens and rattling off his philosophy of greed being good to anyone who will listen. How could you go wrong with that? Well, being the modern Oliver Stone, who last directed the sadly failed George Bush biopic W., there has to be some way of not doing it the right way. Those expecting full on Gekko in Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps will be sadly disappointed. Instead, he becomes a supporting player to a love triangle between Shia LaBeouf, money and Carey Mulligan.

In 2001, corporate raider Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) completes a prison sentence for money laundering. No one is there to meet him. Jump seven years: Gekko is promoting his book, his estranged daughter Winnie (Carey Mulligan) is a political blogger engaged to Jake Moore (Shia LaBeouf), a hot-shot Wall Street trader, and an old nemesis of Gekko's, Bretton James (Josh Brolin), devours the firm Jake works for. When Jake's mentor takes his life, Jake wants revenge and Gordon may be the perfect ally. With the fiscal crisis of September 2008 as background, can Jake maintain Winnie's love, broker a rapprochement with her father, get his revenge, and find funds for a green-energy project he champions; or will greed trump all?

The performances in this are all fantastic. Shia LaBeouf takes the lead role in one of his first performances since that movie Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. He gives it his all, and carries those lulls in the script quite well. Carey Mulligan, who was Oscar nominated for her performance in An Education, puts on a perfect American accent and steals the show...like always. Her and LaBeouf had excellent chemistry, which made their somewhat ordinary story easier to watch. Josh Brolin, the star of Jonah Hex and upcoming True Grit, takes another role of a villain, and, as always, plays it quite well. But we all know that the star of this movie is Michael Douglas. His Golden Globe nomination was well deserved (also was the standing ovation he received for beating cancer). He makes Gordon Gekko as scary as he was in the first film, and even though he is a supporting character, he still makes the film.

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps is a fine sequel which even after 23 years of being off screen, Stone still finds ways to connect with the last one. We see Gekko's rather bulky 'mobile phone' and a cameo from Charlie Sheen as Bud Fox. The one thing Stone didn't carry through was the intense drama. The story is overrun by the soapie story of Winnie forgiving Gekko. Its nice to watch, but sometimes it feels like it belongs to another film, and just ends up making the runtime a little longer. In saying that, the very modern direction from Oliver Stone makes this movie worth its time. It has everything that could make a movie: great performances, great direction, quite a clever and intelligent screenplay. It just should have been better, thats all.


THE VERDICT: Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps is a slightly long performance driven piece all about money. Fans of drama will definitely go for this.

6/10