December 22, 2007

No Country for Old Men

Here is the Charlie Rose show on which he discussed No Country for Old Men with Joel and Ethan Coen, Javier Bardem, and Josh Brolin. I've seen it twice in the theaters, and I think it's a damn fine film. There are moments of pure suspense - the type Alfred Hitchcock used to do (think of the scene in Rear Window when Jimmy Stewart watches as Grace Kelly is being attacked by Raymond Burr). The video:


Here's the film's trailer:

It's odd how the official movie site and the trailer both use music, yet there wasn't a bit of it in the actual film. I expected there would be a soundtrack similar to something like the one used in Fargo (1996). Music is generally such a big part of many Coen films, like Raising Arizona (1987) or The Big Lebowski (1998). But other than during a couple of the most intense moments of suspense, there is absolutely no musical soundtrack. In fact, I wouldn't describe what was used as "music" as much as I would categorize it as "ambient sound." It's one of the things which makes it such a unique film experience.

Still, I had questions about the plot, so I'm reading the novel by Cormac McCarthy. I find McCarthy's not using quotation marks during character dialog to be extremely annoying. And isn't that I'm not up to the challenge of deciphering when the character's are speaking or not - I made it through (and understood) Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury and Absalom, Absalom!. I had planned to delve into McCarthy's novels, but I'm afraid he's lost me with that style. It just seems so unnecessary of a thing for him to do.

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