No Country for the Coen Brothers (Spoilers)

This past weekend, I went to see No Country for Old Men. I was amazed. It was a truly phenomenal movie, from the performances, to the harrowing mood that the stark, nearly toneless soundtrack that left me clutching the arms of my seat. There were speeches, oh my, there were speeches. The characters were all genuinely troubled, from the human flaws of Llewelyn Moss, to the hubris of Carson Wells, to the sheer inhumanity of Anton Chigurh. Chigurh walks out of Carla Jean's house after killing her and he does something simple, yet immensely disturbing -- he checks the bottoms of his shoes. He has just walked out of a house belonging to an innocent woman in the entire mess of the film. He has just shot her. The thing he thinks to do is check his shoes.

This film is an exemplification of the incredible number of issues we, as a society, face today. The people who succeed are those who are without mercy or moral. Those who oppose Chigurh only leave themselves a matter of time until they meet their end. Moss tries to fight Chigurh, and just doesn't have a real chance. The moment he declares his personal vendetta, the audience gets a slight boost of optimism, only to have their hopes shattered a few short scenes later. When we see that Moss is dead, we are left with the worry that there is nothing left to say. Cormac McCarthy and the Coen brothers disagreed. That could have easily been the end of a lesser film, but not here. We see the old school sheriff, played with unwavering brilliance by Tommy Lee Jones, give up. He retires without searching for Chigurh.

No one wins in this film. By the end of the film, there is no sign of the two million dollars that Moss found, and that Chigurh was trying to get. These men all tried to take the easy way out, except for Chigurh, and he is the most successful. Moss dies trying to keep the two million dollars he found. Tommy Jones takes the easy way and simply retires. Chigurh (the haunting Javier Bardem) is the only one in the film who manages to keep his word to himself.

That's the background. Now, here's my problem.

This is a groundbreaking film. It's visceral, filled with bleak humor, astoundingly shot and perfectly performed. The issue is, when we see Ed Tom Bell (Jones) giving his speech at the end, and Chigurh walking away with a boy's shirt slinging his badly broken arm, we are left with the image of Bell talking about his dreams. This is not an ending for public consumption. And that's what makes me ashamed of my society. There was more meaning in this last scene than there could have been in any other ending. It was beautiful, fierce, touching and horrifying all at once. It was how the movie HAD to end.

And yet, everyone around my friend and myself, sat there for a split second and stood quickly, shooting their mouths off about how stupid the ending was before they could process it for even a moment. Several people behind me started a chorus of "What the hell was that," and "I don't know, that ending was stupid."

No, in fact, it wasn't. It was the polar OPPOSITE of stupid. Life situations don't end in explosions or mad embraces. It's what happens after those extraordinary situations that is truly important. No Country for Old Men is a uniquely human film. And yet, the audience fails to see the intelligence in anything. My first film post in this blog was about the fall of the classic. This is why. This is the reason that people don't understand brilliant films. They are so caught up in the tropes of the action movie, the romantic comedy and rapid consumption society that they can't allow themselves to process ANYTHING intellectually. The Coen Brothers have made intelligent films for over 20 years, and they still have to relegate themselves to the indie-rock, coffeehouse crowd. They made an astonishing film that people aren't even considering for Oscar predictions, despite the outstanding performances, direction, editing, cinematography. Everything. It was wonderful. I'm just happy I understand it. I just don't know which to be more horrified by: the movie itself or the fact that about 2 percent of people who see it are going to get it. You tell me.