yeago works

What Not To Do

Salon.com’s review of No Country For Old Men is surprisingly terrible. Not quite as bad as this one, but they’re definitely in the same ballpark.

Firstly, if you’re going to bother reviewing a movie, please attempt cover more material than you found while scrolling the IMDB page. Please give us something more than stock praise for things like its (immaculate) cinematography and the already-token guffawing at Anton Chigurh’s hair (which, I’m sorry to inform you all, makes him more badass, not less).

Secondly, in order to review a movie you have to rise to an above-average understanding. Having a dim idea just won’t do, but if that’s the best you’ve got, at least try to cover that fact up. Don’t say things like:

“No Country for Old Men” is a thriller, although the plot points often connect only tangentially. It’s not supposed to add up in the end, and we’re not supposed to read its plot twists and turns all that literally.
—Stephanie Zacharek @ Salon

Hmpf. So you watched the movie and really found it to be a disjointed David Lynch mish-mash? Then blog not. No Country was exactly opposite of this fumbling description—I’m hard-pressed to think of a nuance in this movie that wasn’t thoughtfully placed, and deeply entrenched in the plot lines. Typically, a slightly off-cuff movie will bathe in vagueness in order to remain entact—this movie didn’t. Every plot point was neatly tied up by the end, only you had to pay attention. Every scene that seemed to connect “only tangentially”, Stephanie, was probably answering questions you just didn’t think to ask.

Salon.com also illiterately refers to Anton’s weapon as “a pressurized thingie used to stun and instantly kill cattle”. I’m not going to pretend to know the name for this ‘thingie’ (aside from air gun and maybe cattle gun), but if you’re going to blog about it, do some google footwork, eh? Provide a service.

Ok then, add something.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say the opposite of everything I’ve read in every other review: this movie is not a thriller. Whaa?? Ok, it was half-thriller—which explains not only the introduction, conclusion, and a dozen or so vigniettes in between (not to mention the title No Country For Old Men). It was a thriller wrapped in the frame of an old-timey piece. We the audience are told why this isn’t the country for old men, but the movie makes a clear priority of these men in the very vivid portraitures of older gentlemen characters—first and foremost Tommy Lee Jones. To see this story as a thriller for your own eyes, rather than seeing it from theirs is, in my opinion, to miss half of the film.

I have sympathy for those who were confused the first time you saw this movie (unless you blogged about it). This movie did seem disjointed but I promise it answers most of its questions (I’m going to comment here some questions I had). Also, I’ll try not to spoil the plot but this movie is daring with its expenditure of characters—the ‘protagonist switch’ that happened late in the movie at first view took me by surprise (until I watched it again and realized this movie was not about Anton -> Llewelyn feud).

In a hilarious and gut-wrenching way my friend’s cell phone went off for a minute in her purse during the closing sequence, as Sheriff Tommy Lee is explaining his dream. I’m glad I saw the end again—it was simple and genuine in a way I’m sure many viewers scoffed at as misplaced or contrived. Meh, I guess most of us are cynical, stimulation junkies. And here we have a movie about exactly that.