Derek Miller
Dr. Childs
English 1301
6, December 2012
No country for old men and
consequences
No country could be
classified as a many things, a horror movie due to excessive amount of gore and
deaths, an action film for the car chases, a western based off the setting of rural west Texas and gun fights. Some may
even describe it as a comedy, Chigurhs dark comedy in the way he delivers his line and dry
dialogue and the relationship between moss and Carla his wife offer some of the
more humorous lines in the film to lighten it up. Most would tell you it is a
combination of all these things and that it's about three men and the consequences
they must face throughout
the film.
Sheriff Tom bell has been a sheriff
most of his life starting when he was just 25 years old. He was a sheriff the
same time his father was. This is a man who served in the military and on his
way to retirement. He has seen every possible type of evil in this world from Nazis to a nineteen year old boy
who killed a girl just because he could. The world appears to be
changing before the sheriff, and it is now full of realities that he finds
difficult to comprehend. (Mangrum 112) It seems now that Chigurh's
in town he appears to somewhat fear what may be out there or fear what he doesn’t understand. When sheriff
bell and Deputy Wendell start searching for Chigurh they stop by mosses house.
They notice moss is long gone and there is a glass of milk that is still fresh
on the table. Wendell points out they just missed them and suggest they go
after him and Bell hesitates and sits down to have a drink. He knows he's close
enough to catch him but maybe out of fear he acts casual and calm on the
outside like there's noting he can do about it. He meets up with Carla to ask
for he helps in finding Moss and promises to keep him safe. This is something
he knows he should have never have promised due to him being as scared of Chigurh
as anyone. Once he finds out moss had been shot he feels and incredible weight
on his shoulders. He will have to deal with the consequences for the rest of
his life knowing he might have been able to prevent his death had he not let
his fear get the best of him and peruse Chigurh and little more
aggressively. While he is able to
understand how many things happen, and this aids him in catching criminals, he
has no categories for understanding why things happen. (McFarland164)
There could
be a number of reasons for his hesitance in this case. More than likely it
could very well be fair.
Not so much the fear of dying but the fear but the fear of failing. Something
or someone of the magnitude of Chigurh has probably never swept through the
small town of. I think bell took this job way to young at a time when there
weren't too
many people like Chigurh around. Bell knew everyone in town on a first name
bases so much that he even knew mosses car just by looking at it. It could even
be he's taking the easy way out being so close to retirement. The burden of
carrying this death with him is what may be what causes him to enter mosses
murder scene knowing perfectly well Chigurh could be inside. Almost if to say he is giving up,
sacrificing himself to Chigurh for not protecting moss like he could have.
Lleweyln
moss is a former Vietnam vet who is now a retired welder living out his days in
west Texas. He is the one character out of the three that has no clear cut
moral compass. He does what he believes is right. It’s hard to say what we would all do in a similar situation.
Being presented with two million dollars and no witness, it's a temptation that
would be hard to resist. If he had taken that money straight to the police,
that would have been the end of it. No one looking for him and he and his
family would be safe. Moss had to deal with the consequences of taking that money and constantly
running from the people who want it back. To his credit he almost got away with
it being a vet he was very smart and always one step ahead of the Mexicans and Chigurh.
You can only run so far before the consequences of your action catch up to you.
Llewelyn Moss is searching for authenticity in the context of betrayal
and moral hypocrisy. (McFarland 167)
When he talks to Chigurh on the phone he was given the choice to give up the
money to save his wife and family's life. He chose to potentially risk his
family's life just to go after Chigurh and get him killed in the process.
Then there
is Chigurh, the most
unusual of the three who is not described in detail a lot in the book. The
majority of the character build was Javier Bardem and the Cohen brothers. “You don't understand. You can't make a
deal with him. Even if you gave him the money he'd still kill you. He's a
peculiar man. You could even say that he has principles. Principles that
transcend money or drugs or anything like that. He's not like you. He's not
even like me.” (Wells) From his methodical way he
talks to the way he dresses. Everyone in town wears denim and fits in to that
west Texas look, while Chigurh also wears denim it’s and black denim
which really shows
He’s a fish out of water trying to fit in. Anton
Chigurh, the antonym of Ed Tom, is bent on finding the money that Moss finds in
the desert, but he is not so much interested in the money itself as he is in
proving a point. (McClure 47)
All his choices and decisions are determined
by fate, whatever happens will happen
or it's up to a coin toss. This ends up working out for him a few times but in
the end he only gets hurt and ultimately doesn't get what he wants. Moss
does not appear to have any belief in a transcendent order, but he does not, on
this account, abandon those around him, and though it leads to his downfall it
is his true strength.
(McClure 51) It's not for certain if he
killed Carla or not, the indication that he walked out of the house without his
shoes on is a sign that he may have killed her. He previously took off his
shoes when he went into the hotel to kill the Mexicans. With all of his deaths
he takes a lot of time touching his victims with his works that he gets hit by
a car that ran a red light. If he had moved on after he found out Moss had been
killed he could have avoided a broken arm and who knows what other damages. The
accident suggests that justice may eventually assert into human affairs. (McFarland
174) It is his belief
in fate that he felt compelled to go find Carla and kill her as he promised
moss he would. He is driven
by some inner principles; people do not enter into the equation. (Grabovets)
The tale of
No country for old men if a common tale, one that has been told in a variety of ways, one movie that was really similar
in its themes was The
Dark Knight and the Batman Mythology. In 2007 Heath ledger
was a set to star in No Country for old men as Chigurh. Shorty there after he
dropped out to play The Joker in The Dark Knight, a role very similar to Chigurh.
The Joker is a
man who does not care about the consequences of his action and does what he has
to get what he wants, plain and simple a psychopath. “Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the
established order, and everything becomes chaos. I’m an agent of chaos. Oh and
you know the thing about chaos, its fair.” (Ledger) Sheriff Bell is more like Commissioner Gordon following the law
and trying to do what's right within the system. Then there is Moss who is more like Batman.
Very looses with his morals and try's to rights the wrongs in his own way,
though very unorthodox and outside the guidelines of the law. In this
case it’s Chigurh wanting the two million dollars and doing anything he has to
to get it, in the same way The Joker or any villain would do the same thing to
take Gotham City.
All three
men even though they never share a moment of screen time all impact each other
in profound ways. Early in the film, he sits on Moss’s sofa after breaking into
his trailer home and stares oddly at his reflection as if experiencing d´ej`a
vu. Shortly after, Bell arrives and sits looking at his own reflection from the
same spot. Both Chigurh and Bell drink from Moss’s bottle of milk. Just as each
of these three men, who never share the screen, sits looking at the same TV, we
are invited to compare them and how they make their way in the modern world. (McClure
46) They all made choices all had consequences, some worst than others.
No Country For Old Men. Dir. Ethan Coen. Perf. Tommy Lee Jones, Josh
Brolin, Javier Bardem. DVD. Miramax Films, 2007.
McClure, Christopher. “No Country For
Old Gods.” Perspectives and Political
Science 39.1 (2010): 46-51. Academic
Search Complete. Web. 6 December. 2012
McFarland, Douglas. “No Country for Old Men as Moral Philiosophy”
163-175. Academic Search Complete. 6 December. 2012
Manfrum, Benjamin. "DEMOCRACY,
JUSTICE, AND TRAGEDY IN CORMAC MCCARTHY'S NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN.." 43
(2011): 107-133.
