No Country for Old Men
I went to the movies to see No Country for Old Men the other day. Very violent, tough movie, but I have not seen a screen villain as vividly rendered and lingeringly unpleasant as Javier Bardem is in this picture since Henry Silva played the angel-dust-snorting hit man in Sharky's Machine with Burt Reynolds. Bardem is not to be believed, he is so intense and eerie.
Thanksgiving was...peaceful. In all of my adult life, I have rarely seen Americans so in need of a vacation, a break, a place to go that is safe and comfortable. I have rarely seen Americans rush toward the Thanksgiving weekend with such need and commitment. This country is coming apart. And people are in a lot of pain about that. Eight years of these lunatics raping everything they see has been exhausting. Americans are exhausted. Our system is breaking down, slowly, and people are, when they get honest about it, frightened about what that means, short and long term. Iraq is a mess and they botched that so badly. Now, some say Iran is next. How can that be?
The American military is staffed by brave, highly trained, competent people. But it's run by idiots. Idiots who are going to kill a lot of innocent people and get some of us killed along the way.
Go see No Country for Old Men. It's a metaphor for Iraq and the post 9/11 world.
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I would go if Bush and company would leave office even one day sooner. Go if your are in denial. But if you are past denial, movies like this are shear terror to watch. I get enough of that by checking the Internet for the real news.
I haven't seen the movie yet, but I'm dyeing to see it. I'm from Brazil and I refuse to download it, I'll have to wait for it to arrive here.
What you said about Javier is absolutely true, he's a wonderful actor.
I got the chance to see the world premiere of "Love in the time of cholera", and he's simply amazing in it. One of the main reasons I want to see "No country..." is because he's character is totally different from any other he's ever done, so this should be very refreshing, as was seeing him as Florentino Ariza.
Your post only made me want to see it more... :-D
Alec with your insight concerning NCTOM I respect you even more now, and you've been one of my favorite people for many years.
After seeing NCFOM twice I still want to see it again.
It was full of meaning and many many metaphors that allows a viewer to come away with numerous potential conclusions.
Best movie I've seen in a long time and is a guaranteed classic
Rather than exhort people to see this gem of a film, who'd you ban from seeing, on the basis they'd never get the point?
Due to my work schedule I am unable to take the time to go and see a movie or take a vacation so I will take your review and recommendation of "No Country for Old Men" with regard. I do however turn the TV on while I am at work and listen mostly to the news and lately the political debates. They all lie and they all promise the world. How can one determine who will actually end the war, or who will actually reform healthcare, or who will actually not raise taxes? I think that every politician running for office should be hooked up to a polygraph during a debate and their results made public so Americans when voting can make an informed decision when determining which lie is least likey to affect change in their lives. Elected officials should also be required to undergo a polygraph when confronted on such issues like the circumstances that were used to justify our involvment in the Iraq war and if found to have lied to the American public, they should be prosecuted....Period. The congressional hearings that are used in determining the truth for such matters are a farce and nothing but a waste of the tax payers money.
I do not know who I will be voting for in this next election but I do know that this blonde will not be voting for Hillary Clinton. I cannot trust the judgement of a woman who looked the other way knowing that her husband repeatedly disrespected her by continually having affairs with other women. Staying in a relationship knowing that you are being disrespected is a sign of weakness and demonstrates an inability to take control of ones life and the last thing that we need is another weak president. Our country simply cannot afford to take such a risk.
From what you have blogged, you would enjoy the movie "Zeitgeist" on Google. Just go to Google and search for "Zeitgeist the movie" click on and there it is 1 hour and 55 minutes long. You can interrupt the movie anytime just by taping the space bar once then wheh you want to resume, just tap the space bar once and you can continue watching it.
It is a fantastic movie examining the basis of religion, the 9/11 false development, the idiotic establishment of the international banking system, and the Bush - Carlyle Group arrangement and many more hoaxes on the American Public. Enjoy.
Dear Mr. Baldwin, I'm responding to your comment about the US military. I spent 6 months in Baghdad in 2003-2004 extending my hand in friendship to Iraqi people after all our international efforts to prevent the invasion failed. I tried to extend my hand in friendship as well to the many US soldiers I met as a concommitant of daily life in Baghdad. I won't go into the details of my experience but I think it'd be wise to go to Iraq and hang out with soldiers, not in their high security quarters, but on the streets and around their interactions with Iraqi people and then make judgments about their training, competence and bravery.
The movie sucked. Too slow. The message so mundane as to be unworthy of the time expended upon it. What death is implacable as well as immutable? I'm shocked! As to America, it seems that there're many places in the world to which this film would apply. Only the scenes of Texas life contained interesting truth, and then Tommy Lee Jones overplayed some of these. The Coens lost me at the first voice over. Listen to it yourself! Gimme my money back.
My older brother and I went to see this movie during the Thanksgiving holiday. This might spoil the plot -- so don't read if you don't want to ruin the movie;
At first, my brother said, he didn't understand why a picture would bother to make a point that; "there is no point." Sure, in the real world, the good guy doesn't win, but there was no cathartic change in the bad guy, nor anyone to root for who overcame anything.
I loved it -- but not because I enjoyed it. Sometimes its great that a picture acknowledges what your heart already despairs over. People have to make sense out of disorder, and define a pattern, the bear attacked you because you have a bad spirit on you -- a "reason." It's one thing to make a random slasher picture that gives no sense for who survived or why, and how they bad guy can be so lucky. This picture was different, and I think the synopsis -- the big hint, was when the Sheriff was reminiscing about a particularly troublesome news story he read; "there was an old couple who had a hotel, that would kill people and then take their money and bury them behind the house. Why they would bother to torture them first, I don't know. But the bodies out back didn't alert anyone -- it wasn't until some old man rand naked with a dog collar around his neck that anyone took notice."
The Sheriff must come to the realization, that with truly bad people who leave no witnesses and have no remorse, it is only dumb luck that stops them -- as it does any of us. Bad things happen to everyone, even bad guys. I think this point is driven home when the Javier Bardem is driving away from the final, pointless killing that only makes sense to him, and is struck by a car running a red light. He is injured but leaves the scene and gets away with it.
>>> CONTINUED
With all that anarchy its gratifying to be able to get behind a little documentary like "Wade in the Water". Shot by students at the Singleton Charter School in New Orleans and edited by volunteer artist/directors Gabriel Nussbaum and Liz Wood. Premiering Dec 4th at the Prytania Theater in New Orleans.Profits go to the recovery.
the only relationship between this big steaming stinking quivering shovelful of violence-for-intellectuals and iraq is that its "villain" offers an alternative icon of evil besides the overfed nearsighted american monsters we have unleashed on the people of iraq.
andre breton had it right. nobody who kills and tortures for money can be considered RELIABLY evil because their motive might disappear- and with it their evil. to be reliably evil like soldiers, one must be evil EVEN WHEN IT'S CONTRARY TO HIS OWN INTERESTS.
sorry creative artists- you just don't have the chops to get the monstrosity of america right- even as the curtain goes up on the horror of insect america with it's probiscis stunk into the globe itself and sucking the earth's essence into its own belly. art is designed to hide- not to reveal. this is the truth of the revolutionary's rejection of "expression" as reality.
I laughed five times hard at the NCFOM repartee dialogue and read 'til 4 a.m. Dangerously heroic to believe we will enjoy new bests if we can come to terms with the worst. Silence and garden tending might still be our last best personal hope.
Historys' lesson of the seven stages of the rise and fall of civilizations: Mixture, Gestation, Expansion, Confrontation,Universal (Belief yours is the end of history culmination), Decay and Invasion makes our time tough to enjoy.
What passes through from civilization to the next civilization is not culture but heightened weaponry. Not encouraging, but living in the longest peace between wars between major countries, is. Waterloo to Crimean war about 45 years; 2007-1945=62 years.
Hail the 17th year of the New Peace.
How to enjoy?
Dive to your deepet themes and write and live them.
Some here have asked, "How does No Country for Old Men make Baldwin think of post 9-11 America?" Easy. America's idea of itself is gone. All i can say is that maybe that's a good thing. America was never innocent, even if we believed the lies about history we told our children. Welcome to the grown-up table, eh? It all hangs on the Constitution.
We will figure it out or not. (Second prize, "steak knives".)
By the way, enjoy the non-pompous way Mr. Baldwin writes. Some comedians, who will not be mentioned here, move so ponderously into intellectual territory. Baldwin has nothing to prove as he is smart as a whip.
There are at least several levels of literacy. Level one is knowing what the words mean. Then one hopefully goes on to be able to read for tone and context. It's clear there are few in the comments section who are struggling.
I like Alec Baldwin; I think he is a pretty decent actor. What I noticed here is that he really didn't offer much of an answer to this national angst. Going to see a violent movie probably won't do much to undo the damage done to the American society over the last 7+ years.
I'm trying to find an attorney with stones as big as mine--I want to sue Bush, Cheney and Rice (Dewey, Cheatem and Howe) for misuse of public funds, abuse of authority and for using public office for personal gain. There are probably a few dozen other violations we could throw in. I would like to see it as a class action with 250,000,000 plaintiffs. I am 100% serious.
As to a metaphor in the movie, I see one in the deal the Bardem character inflicted on the Brolin character: You come here and give me the money as I kill you and I will spare your wife - or you resist and I take the money, kill you and your wife. Isn't this the all-powerful capitalist system talking? You totally submit and I will screw you but may not do the worst that I can - you resist and I will do the worst.
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Posted November 23, 2007 | 02:40 PM (EST)