The MoFo Movie Club Discussion - No Country For Old Men

I've never thought nor said Fargo was based on a real incident, Pike: Didn't even recall the "based on a real story" tag and had forgotten about the unfortunate Japanese lady. What I was trying to say is that the story, the plot, starts with a foolish plan by the car salesman to have his wife kidnapped so he can collect a ransom from his father-in-law. That was the basis for the rest of the film. It was as foolish a plan for that fictional character as it would have been for a real person. Things like that never work out well in a book, a movie, or real life. I also don't think that wood chipper was big enough to put a real body through. Not enough horsepower for a tibia. But it still was an entertaining story.

But I was responding to a question in THIS tread. How would the person I was responding to know to look for my reply in the OTHER thread, which I didn't even know existed? And who says we can mention only one movie in each thread? Doesn't sound very practical to me. Certainly isn't very democratic.

I hope you're just kidding, Yoda. It's not my purpose to ruin movies for anyone. I was just discussing what seem to me to be interesting aspects of the plot. For instance, I often ask myself, "What, if anything, did I learn from the movie I just saw?" Well, the main lesson from No Country is to fasten both the deadbolt and the door-chain on the door of your motel room. Had the Mexicans done so, they might have had a chance to defend themselves when the psycho broke in. But of course that bolt-shooter wouldn't have worked on a deadbolt or chain--just those flimsy little door-handle locks. And the door-handle lock was the only one used on the motel-hotel sets in that movie. I always find it interesting how writers and directors have to rearrange reality to make their plots work. It's a quirk.

I meant more for posterity's sake, and to spark further discussion on their entire filmography in a thread that's already doing that. I wasn't saying remove it from here, I was saying participate in that one, too.

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"Film is a disease. When it infects your bloodstream it takes over as the number one hormone. It bosses the enzymes, directs the pineal gland, plays Iago to your psyche. As with heroin, the antidote to Film is more Film." - Frank Capra

Oh. Sorry. I hate it that emails don't have facial features and body language or even a tone of voice to go with the words. Anyway, thanks for the heads-up and the invitation.

Ruf: Read my rant on text communication in the misc section. Or, to save you time, I'll just say here that I agree with you...

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I thought the movie was great, not the best of the Coen bros. movies but not bad at all...movie of the year...not so much...

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"Fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity" -George Carlin (RIP good sir)

I hesitate to jump in now because we're getting off topic a bit, but for me, what is just so freaking great about Fargo is that the wood chipper murder did actually happen. Obviously not the same as in the film but it did happen nonetheless. God, the Coen's are just absolutely brilliant! Who comes up with stuff like that?

rufnek: I believe I've seen you make mention before that you were a police officer or crime scene investigator of some kind yes?

Don't you think its a lot more difficult to get cleanly away with murder now than ever before, what with how far most crime labs have come with DNA testing and Universal data bases for fingerprints ands other tools that police have today? I certainly do.

A very good example is right here in my back yard. The Green River Killer was just recently caught because they were finally able to use the DNA evidence that they'd kept on ice for 20 plus years. It was refreshing to see the main detective on the case after so many years still there working the case and finally getting his man. He worked as hard as anyone could work a case where there were very few witnesses and most of the killings were completely random (except for the main connection of course that most of the victims were prostitutes) which is from what I've read the best way to kill someone if you're so inclined. But, he always believed he knew his man he just couldn't prove it.

The thing was back then that during the 80's (like this movie) they just didn't have the technology to back themselves up. I know we around here have never seen anything quite like this guy except maybe Bundy but he didn't spend all of his time here either. So in a rather long winded way my point is that although there may have been good detectives back in those days it was much easier to get away with totally random and insane acts of violence than it is today. So I know you've been doing a bit of harping about realism but to me that whole part of it is quite real. What do you think?

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We are both the source of the problem and the solution, yet we do not see ourselves in this light...

No, I've never been or claimed to be a policeman or investigator of any type. I'm just an old-time newspaper reporter who got into this business more than 30 years when I was taught to dig up as many facts as possible from all available sources and let the reader decide what he thinks is right or wrong. In the process, I spent years covering the police beat--the cop shop--and criminal courts all the way from the justice of the peace to federal district courts. So I know a bit about how both work.

What I think is that there have been so many TV programs about Crime Scene Investigators that the general public now thinks that's a magic bullet and probably will convict almost anybody based on what the CSI testifies to. But there are investigators and there are investigators. Some are capable. Some are concientious. Some are truthful. But some are not. Even TV recognizes this: Law and Order had one program about a lab worker who lied about evidence to help police officers build a better case against their prime suspect. On CSI Miami, the head of the investigation team in one episode spots a fingerprint he hadn't noticed before on an article of evidence in a current trial and has to re-open the whole case. Here in Houston as in several other cities, incompetence, shoddy standards, and outright falsification of evidence have been uncovered that threw many convictions into question.

So yeah, we have better technology now. But the same caliber of people gathering and processing the evidence. Plus in real life, CSI doesn't come to every crime scene. Police don't always take finger-prints because they know that in a public place like a bank or cafe there are going to be too many fingerprints to process. Also municipal and county police have a strong dislike--hate, even--for the FBI and will not involve them in an investigation if there is any way to avoid it. Look at the interaction between police and federal agents in Die Hard--it's really not too far off the mark. I once knew a police chief in a small Texas town who was an ex-FBI agent, and even he didn't like or trust the FeeBees, who want all the information and data from local officers but won't share the knowledge that the FBI has uncovered. To the average cop or deputy or state trooper on the beat, FBI means Fumbling, Bumbling Idiots.

As for DNA wrapping up old cases, nobody has kept evidence for 20 years waiting for DNA or other technology to come along primarily because no one knew back then it was coming. What happened was DNA came along and somebody thought of some old case, and was lucky enough to find the old evidence that fortunately had not yet been thrown out.

The thing about serial killers is that some get caught after their first murder so no one knows that he meant to kill others. Or someone goes on killing for years because he looks and acts so normal otherwise that he raises no suspicions, not even from his victim until too late (which couldn't be said about the crazy killer in No Country who acts weird and creepy in roadside service station). But there probably are serial killers who never get caught or authorities never recognize that the killings were not natural or even connected in someway.

Yeah, the authorities have more technology for catching serial killers, but they also have smaller staff, stricter training requirements, bigger cities to police, larger populations to comb through, bigger case loads, and then have to go to court as witnesses. Meanwhile, outlaws and killers can circulate easier via interstates and airlines, foreign and domestic. They have more ways to contact potential victims via telephone and internet. They may even be better armed than the police, like those two bank robbers in California with bullet-proof vests, automatic weapons, armor-piercing ammo who shot up a whole squad of officers in their escape attempt.

What police always have going for them both today, 20 years ago, or 100 years ago, is that they have almost an unlimited amount of time to eventually solve a crime. There have been cases where the original investigator retires or dies, but someone else takes over. Especially in murder cases, since there is no time limitations on the eventual prosecution of murder.

Second thing is that some officers, not all, really are as dedicated as the detective in the Green River cases and some others I've known who just keep picking away at a case.

The biggest advantage that I've seen, however, is not that cops are so smart but most criminals are really stupid and do dumb things that attract suspicion and capture. They keep doing the same kind of crimes in the same fashion that worked before, and eventually their luck runs out and there's a policeman in the right place at the right time.

But there have been cases that the police and district attorneys have fouled up so badly they'll never be solved. The murder of the little Benet beauty queen, for example. They've used all the technology available and still have no clue to the killer.

As to your last point--Harping??? I'm sure I don't know what you mean!

Ah I see, my memory isn't completely gone, I knew it was something in or around the police field.

Oh I don't know about that, I think there is a relatively small part of the population left that doesn't believe everything they see on TV. We watch a lot of those "true crime" stories and the like on A&E and what used to be Court TV and although it can be a good deal dryer than CSI or any number of those CSI type of shows, the lab work they do on them in a lot of ways is pretty similar to what is seen on CSI, just not as glamorous obviously.


All that other stuff aside though, you didn't really answer my question. Do you or don't you think its harder to get away with murder today than it was, say 25 years ago? No matter how inadequate an investigator is I think you have to admit that they have many many more tools to back them up than ever before.

To get back to the movie a bit, that reminds of another of the things I really like about this film. Even though Sheriff Bell obviously feels out matched when dealing with these murders he doesn't get down. He still tries to take as much of it in stride as a man that has seen to much can. I really found that very endearing. And Tommy Lee really made me believe it. Man this is a good flick.

Okay, I'll try to spell it out in more detail. I agree there is more technology available today, but that really doesn't apply to most murders, because most murders are crimes of passion. Someone gets mad and someone dies. Most of the people murdered in this country are killed by relatives or coworkers or supposed friends or someone they know and it's usually an open-and-shut case because others witness the killing or the killer says, "Yeah, I killed the SOB." That was true 20 years ago and it's still true today. Although random and serial killings make the news, it's relatively rare for people to be killed by a complete stranger. Most killings occur in the home, usually by someone of the same race who lives in that same home, and with a weapon kept there in the house. The killings are seldom planned, they occur in a moment of anger, and the killer usually regrets it later. And the number of homicides peak around the holidays from Thanksgiving through Christmas when more relatives come together indoors because of the cold weather. So police technology rarely has anything to do with it.

But for a definitive answer, you should check the statisitics. Has the murder rate gone up or down in recent years? I suspect that the number of murders has increased as the population increases, but that the overall percentage of murders has decreased. That was the trend at one point, but I don't know if it's still true because I no longer keep up with such things.

So pending more statistical information, I'd say that truly "getting away with murder" has never been "easy." Most killings have always been solved; some just take longer than others. No doubt having more and better technology helps close cases, but there are so many factors involved that I'm not sure you can point to that as the major factor.

Consider the action in No Country--would DNA or chemicals that reveal blood-splatters or any other technology have helped solve those crimes? I don't think so. The best clue they had to the psycho killer was the dime he left behind after removing the air conditioning vent. That may have had a fingerprint or two--I don't remember if he was wearing gloves or not. But the dime was there mainly to tell the audience he'd been there and got the money. In a "real life" situation, I don't think he would have left the coin behind.

Now I know why your movie reviews are so analytical.

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"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how the Tatty 100 is done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves." - Brendan Behan

I agree with this point - I actually meant more that with the current sophistication of law enforcement/investigation techniques the business of being a successful serial killer must be much harder. In other words, killers today have to be far more sophisticated to escape detection.

Anton wouldnt have been able to simply open doors with his own hands leaving behind messy crime scenes; leave bodies strung out behind him in a trail; leave law enforcement (state, local ....Federal!) scared, bewildered and sitting on their .. hands.

So yeah. I grant you that people like him exist, but not with the rudimentary efforts and clear impunity shown in No Country.

However, I could see this happening today only if I imagine that it happens all in a rural environment, and I've more and more wondered if there are enclaves in Texas, police force included, that are "stuck in the ..[INSERT DECADE]?"

If so, people like Anton would thrive. Scary.

I mean only that its not your summer feel-good blockbuster. Good guys dont always win. Sometimes you die. Sometimes you die earlier than normal. I'm aware fatalism exists in movies, but I dont think its as prominent in most of your mainstream Hollywood hits. I felt it had a dignity to it that was refreshing.


ruf, I find that your first sentence contradicts your second. I define the second as maturity. Age gives a person perspective. Or resignation. Or. Depression. Kinda like TLJ's character.

Really? So, did he let the guy who's car he stole on the side of the highway have the benefit of a coin toss? I thought he just mercilessly killed him with the airgun.

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If you mean me, yeah, it's become a habit to pick things apart. I do it with movies, TV, books, even with songs I notice the bad grammar just to make verses rhyme.

Yes, law enforcement has better technology now. But what is sophisticated about a trucker picking up hitchikers and prostitutes along the highway, killing them in his truck, and dumping their bodies along the roadside? Or in luring victims to one's home, killing them, and burying their bodies in the backyard, under the house, or in storage sheds?

I don't think the probability of capture influences serial killers. Like I said, most killings are done by rather ordinary folks and are crimes of passion directed at one victim. There are also gang shootings and nervous junkies killing people during robberies and muggings. But a true serial killer is driven by something beyond that. Serial killers feel a need, even a desire, to kill that forces them to seek out new victims even as the hunt for them intensifies. Some even taunt police through messages to officials or reporters. In one case, the killer even wrote to the victim's family. It often seems that escaping detection matters less to a serial killer than to maybe a husband plotting to kill his wife for insurance. Plus we have "new" types of serial killers now--the disgruntled employee who goes to the workplace and shoots down fellow workers, the students who take guns to school and shoot anyone who moves. These killers don't even try to escape; they usually kill themselves, too.

There have always been serial killers--Jack the Ripper for one; an old man--I think his name was Fish--who around the turn of the century in the US killed young girls and ate parts of their bodies. I think the first modern serial killer I can recall in my lifetime was Charles Starkweather. It seems that we hear of such killers more often today, but is that because there are more of them now or a widespread news network today to report such killings? (I don't think Fish or his victims made the front page anywhere outside of New York.) Are more being uncovered now by new police technology? Or is because we have more street lights, more traffic on the streets, more neighborhood watches, and more people who no longer ignore the neighbors' suspicious behavior the way that folks used to ignore spousal and child abuse.

So yeah, if I were going to commit a crime, I'd worry alot about authorities' ability to detect blood stains despite attempts to clean or hide it, to match hair and carpet fibers, to identify tire tracks and DNA, even the ability to track embezzled or drug funds to foreign deposits. You and I look at all the cards stacked against us and decide a life of crime is not for us. A serial killer, a spree killer, a mass murder of any kind doesn't care because something--a sick mind, a sick soul, or just plain meaness--is driving him to kill. Yes, he can be crafty. He can be lucky. But he's rarely all that sophisticated. The more times he kills, the more chances he runs that he'll be captured, and yet he keeps on killing.


The old man in the service station and the widow in her home didn't have anything the the killer wanted or needed and were not a threat to him, so it didn't matter if they lived or died. The Mexican killers in the motel room, Cowboy Woody and his boss, were competitors and so had to die. The deputy and roadside motorist had to be killed so he could escape. No coin toss for them.

I have to say that this is probably my favorite movie out of 2007, closely followed by There Will Be Blood. First off I love how the movie has almost no soundtrack through the whole thing, even credits. I think this is a different kind of movie for the coens, and just goes to show the wide range of talent they possess. Javier Bardem was absolutely amazing, and was a very chilling character. Tommy Lee Jones has a good performance as usual, and Josh Brolin is pretty good as well. A lot of people hate on the ending, but I think it sort of sums up the title of the movie, No County For Old Men. Jones' character quites his job because he's old and his job is tough. He just sits there and tells his dreams about his father, and it abruptly ends. A lot of people say this is vert anti-climactic, but I think it fits this particular movie well. And it shows how people of an older generation sort of dislike how the world is changing so fast.

Overall, great movie, instant classic in my book, and once again a job well done by the Coens.

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The Dude Abides.

The exact point I wanted made: a killer, who knows he's a killer, but knows that life has value (if only to others).

So. Death to those who oppose him. Death to those who impede him, or have what he needs to progress. And since life is valuable, all other spectators/sideliners who are unlucky/unfortunate enough to come into contact with him - a coin toss, a gamble with fate to determine if Death is for them. Death surrounds him (one could argue that he IS Death, or its harbinger), but he uses the coin to allow some to escape it.

And so you see. A method to his madness.

I think Llewellyn understood it at the end - which would be why she didnt try to run. She knew there was no coin toss for her.

All madmen have methods or ways of functioning that seem sane to them.

Well, he offered her a coin toss which she turned down because as she said, "It's not the coin, it's you" making the life or death decision. I think the coin toss was merely a way to salve his conscious by saying it's not me deciding who is to live or die, it's fate, the luck of a coin-toss. It's one thing to kill the person he's hired to kill or to kill to defend himself or to escape or to get whatever he wants or needs. The coin-toss is reserved only for those he really had no reason to kill. That confrontation with the service station attendant was totally uncalled for. He could have made his purchases and left without ever saying a word and no one would ever have been the wiser as to who or what he is. Instead, he confronts the old man and scares hell out of him. That makes him someone the old man will remember, so if the law had come along in search of him and asked the station operator if anyone unusual had been by, the old man would have said, "Damn right!"

There was no need for him to have gone out of his way to kill the widow. No one was paying him, she couldn't identify him having never seen him, she had none of the loot on her. The only reason he goes is that he had told her dead husband he would kill her if he didn't surrender the money. But by killing her, he puts himself at the greatest risk since the start of the movie when he was under arrest. Fate turned on him for a change, with that car that comes out of nowhere to hit him. He could have been killed in that wreck; he was badly injured and therefore again called attention to himself. The two kids aren't going to forget a man with a broken bone sticking through his arm who pays big bucks for one kid's shirt. This time the local police will investigate the wreck and they're going to be suspicious of a man with a badly broken arm that could be life-threatening but who leaves the scene of the accident and doesn't seek medical treatment. They're going to be even more suspicious when they find he was driving a stolen car, maybe even find a weapon in it, and eventually a dead woman is discovered a short distance in the opposite direction on the street he was traveling. And this time there are two witness who can describe him to police.

Actually, there were four killings in that film that puzzle me. The first was whoever blew out the side window of that pickup to kill the dying Mexican behind the wheel and then removed the bed-load of narcotics. As I mentioned earlier, they could pulled him out of the cab and driven off the pick up rather than take the time and trouble to remove the load. The second and third killings were the two guys who brought the psycho to the scene of the shoot-out. They were expecting him, so obviously had sent for him or someone higher up had told them he was coming, which means that basically they were on the same side. Obviously, the older, better dressed man was in the executive branch of the drug trade, a man with connections, not a soldier in the field, and the other was his body guard. So why kill them? The only thing I can figure is that in the drug trade, when something goes wrong that's not your fault, you still pay for it. Or more probably, the director was going for another shock for the audience.

The fourth killing is the guy in the pickup that the cowboy hunter with the money stops on the empty street. OK, I can see killing the driver first so that the guy with the money doesn't get away; had he killed the guy with the money first, there's a very small chance that the driver may have taken off with the dead body and the bag of money (I doubt it; he probably would have been shocked and would have hesitated just like the guy with the money did. But having shot the driver in the head or neck or wherever he shot him the first time, why waste another shot on him? Why not put that second shot into the money-bag man who was then still sitting there in the narrow and lighted confines of a pickup cab? The killer then could have collected the money at his leisure with no threat to himself. Instead, he gets wounded in a shoot-out and his target escapes again. And that driver was the only person the killer ever shot twice.

Just curious--different in what way? As I recall, Blood Simple also was set in Texas and was extremely violent. That scene where the "dead" man regains consciousness and tries to crawl away, forcing a struggle on the side of a busy highway before a pounding with a shovel finally renders him manageable, is IMHO more creepy and memorable than anything in No Country. Fargo and Barton Fink were just as violent and bloody, Fargo with a comparable body count, BF with equally senseless killings. Seems to me the four films have more similarities than differences, but perhaps you see something I missed.

I completely forgot he offered her a coin toss, so thanks for the reminder. Now I remember thinking she shouldve taken the coin toss, because that, at least, would have afforded her some chance of life within the "Aton Universe."

Strange justice, but justice nonetheless.

Im agreed that he was killer, and that he enjoyed killing for killing's sake, and that the coin toss was his way of salving his conscious - I guess I thought all of that went without saying. What I'm saying, though, is that:

a: you have a killer
b: who likes to kill (indiscriminately)
c: but who will under certain circumstances hold himself back (e.g. leave your fate up to a coin toss)

I see a certain dignity in the order and restraint that the coin toss provides - once we get beyond the clear insanity of it all. If he truly were as simplistic as a man who butchers purely for the joy of killing, he would have had a weighted coin, and would have always called the appropriate side so that the victim lost.

Instead, contrary to reason and logic (as you have pointed out), he left behind him several people who had won the coin toss, and who could identify him to the authorities. NOT the behavior of someone with a singular bloodlust.

Just IMO the eerieness of it, and the quietness. And also the way the movie ends.