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No Country For Old Men [2007] | ![No Country For Old Men [2007]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51jqVo%2BHIHL._SL160_.jpg)
 enlarge | Directors: Ethan Coen, Joel Coen
Actors: Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin, Kelly Macdonald, Stephen Root
Studio: Paramount Home Entertainment
Category: DVD
List Price: £19.99
Buy Used: £4.50
You Save: £15.49 (77%)
New (20) Used (9) Collectible (2) from £4.50
Rating:  114 reviews
Sales Rank: 46
Format: Pal
Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
Region: 2
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 117 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
EAN: 5014437942838
ASIN: B00147AJQ8
Theatrical Release Date: 2007
Release Date: June 2, 2008
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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Amazon.co.uk Review
The Coen brothers make their finest thriller since Fargo with a restrained adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel. Not that there aren't moments of intense violence, but No Country for Old Men is their quietest, most existential film yet. In this modern-day Western, Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) is a Vietnam veteran who needs a break. One morning while hunting antelope, he spies several trucks surrounded by dead bodies (both human and canine). In examining the site, he finds a case filled with $2 million. Moss takes it with him, tells his wife (Kelly Macdonald) he's going away for awhile, and hits the road until he can determine his next move. On the way from El Paso to Mexico, he discovers he's being followed by ex-special ops agent Chigurh (an eerily calm Javier Bardem). Chigurh's weapon of choice is a cattle gun, and he uses it on everyone who gets in his way--or loses a coin toss (as far as he's concerned, bad luck is grounds for death). Just as Sheriff Bell (Tommy Lee Jones), a World War II veteran, is on Moss's trail, Chigurh's former colleague, Wells (Woody Harrelson), is on his. For most of the movie, Moss remains one step ahead of his nemesis. Both men are clever and resourceful--except Moss has a conscious, Chigurh does not (he is, as McCarthy puts it, "a prophet of destruction"). At times, the film plays like an old horror movie, with Chigurh as its lumbering Frankenstein monster. Like the taciturn terminator, No Country for Old Men doesn't move quickly, but the tension never dissipates. This minimalist masterwork represents Joel and Ethan Coen and their entire cast, particularly Brolin and Jones, at the peak of their powers. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
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| Customer Reviews: Read 10 more reviews...
 I loved it, BUT its not for everyone April 21, 2008
D. Lynch
32 out of 38 found this review helpful
This Oscar winning film is based on an unusual 2005 novel by American author Cormac McCarthy and is very faithful to the book. Beautifully brought to life with stunning cinematography, inventive direction, some great set pieces and, for the most part, realistic acting. I say for the most part because the main villain, played by Javier Bardem (who also won an Oscar) is like a malevolent phantom; a creature of pure evil, more like the Devil than a person. His nightmarish performance is the best part of the movie - every time he is on screen he chills and fascinates in equal measure.
The film is a modern day Western, set in 1980 on the US / Mexico border with a plot so simple it's not worth mentioning. The action is viewed from the perspectives of the three main characters; the psycho Bardem, a world-weary (and philosophising) Sheriff played by Tommy Lee Jones, and a man who gets himself into a heap of trouble, played by Josh Brolin. Although told at a slow pace, the first 2 thirds are very compelling, mostly due to the well-worked set-pieces and the ever-menacing presence of Bardem. The movie does however become ever more strange with a somewhat modernist attention to detail on small things, while the big events get glossed over. By the final third, it has become so interiorised that the action is threatening to cease at any moment. And in fact that's what it does. The film ends when you least expect it to. This has infuriated and baffled many, but, in restrospect, I feel it finishes at just the right time. It's in keeping with the real themes of the movie, which are not spelled out, (and it wouldn't be right for me to spell them out either).
If I had to compare this film to other Coen Bros films; the first two thirds are like Blood Simple and Fargo whereas the final third is more like Barton Fink (i.e a bad dream!). Not everybody's cup of tea, for sure, but like I said, I loved it.
Miles better than the book - a Coen masterpiece June 13, 2008
KM (England)
10 out of 13 found this review helpful
'No Country For Old Men' is the movie adaption of the novel by Cormac McCarthy and begins when Llewellyn Moss is out hunting when he comes across the scene of a drug deal gone wrong where several bodies have been shot to death. At the scene he finds a briefcase containing about 2.4 million dollars. He then makes the decision of taking it and going on the run which leads him into a whole world of trouble. Also an escaped prisoner and ruthless murderer Anton Chigurh (not Sugar!) is on the loose and is also after the money, killing anybody who gets in his way. Sherriff Bell is on the case in one of the most dangerous of his life.
I was dying to see this film months ago after seeing the trailers and missed it when it was at the cinema, so read the novel in eager anticipation of the DVD release and I have to admit that I wasn't impressed by it at all, mainly because of how badly it was written. Luckily the Coens have done an excellent job of taking the decent parts of the book and the story, which was actually very good, and have came up with one of the best and exciting thrillers I've seen in years. The film starts of quite slowly but as soon as Moss finds the cash the chase is on and it is a literally non-stop pursuit with so much tension for the next hour and a half.
Anton is a truly terrifying character that seems to be so heartless and ruthless with the way he just kills anybody who gets in his way, with his air canister or silenced shotgun. Llewelyn's character is also much better in the film than he is in the book as in the book he was very arrogant and irritating which made me not care too much what happened to him really but in the film his character is much more likeable and did make me want him to get away.
Overall this is one of the best thrillers I've seen in a very long time with amazing action and excitement, a great cast and characters and some really breathtaking scenery and camera work. The only thing that lets this down a little is the ending which sort of just trails off and then finishes suddenly, leaving you guessing what happens next. Anyway, I highly recommend this DVD/Blu Ray and would definitely recommend this over the book. The Coens have done it again and created yet another cinema masterpiece.
No Country For Anyone April 20, 2008
prisrob (New EnglandUSA)
32 out of 44 found this review helpful
"Misguided souls will tell you that No Country for Old Men is out for blood, focused on vengeance and unconcerned with the larger world outside a standard-issue suspense plot. Those people, of course, are deaf, dumb and blind to anything that isn't spelled out between commercials on dying TV networks. McCarthy reveals a soulless America that is no country for anyone, never mind old men." Peter Travers
Cormac McCarthy's book from whence this film came is a masterpiece. The Coen Bros. have done homage to McCarthy. Not much, if anything veered from the original manuscript. Magnificent is how I would describe this film. The characters were all as I pictured in my mind. Tommy Lee Jones as Sheriff Ed Tom Bell is the hard nosed, difficult to please but compassionate codger he was meant to be. He knows the country is in trouble- drugs have taken over his West Texas area and nothing but trouble is to come.
Trouble comes by the dozen and before too many scenes there are blood, bones and bodies strewn throughout the landscape. The man who has caused this massacre is Anton Chigurh, played by Javier Bardem. And by the way Mr Bardem won an Oscar for his portrayal. When you think of the worst of the worst there is Chigurh. Probably the most heinous killer in filmdom history. He likes to play games and will flip a coin for your life. Something went wrong with one of his drug deals and all were killed and the money and drugs are gone. Llewellyn Moss played brilliantly by Josh Brolin finds the money and the drugs and all Hell is about to break loose for the man.
From one horrendous scene to the next, we sit on tenterhooks, holding our breath while Chigurh and Moss play cat and mouse. Action aplenty. Words of wisdom and grief from Sheriff Bell and his crew. The scenery, the photography, the score are all brilliant. Kelly MacDonald who plays Moss's wife and is an absolute smash I remembered from the BBC series "State of Play'.
"Still, if "No Country for Old Men" were a simple face-off between the sheriff's goodness and Chigurh's undiluted evil, it would be a far stiffer, less entertaining picture. Llewellyn is the wild card -- a good old boy who lives on the borderline between good luck and bad, between outlaw and solid citizen -- and Mr. Brolin is the human center of the movie, the guy you root for and identify with even as the odds against him grow steeper by the minute. And the minutes fly by, leaving behind some unsettling notions about the bloody, absurd intransigence of fate and the noble futility of human efforts to master it. Mostly, though, "No Country for Old Men" leaves behind the jangled, stunned sensation of having witnessed a ruthless application of craft." A.O. Scott
The best film of the year and it garnered an Oscar. Well deserved, the film was everything it should have been and more. Cormac McCarthy has been honored.
Highly, Highly Recommended. prisrob 04-13-08
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No Country for Impatient Audiences March 21, 2008
Louis Ackerman (UK)
12 out of 16 found this review helpful
Finally a film that knocks for six the idea that all American Southerners are hick idiots. Here we are presented with cunning, intelligent and skilled everymen with not a buck toothed, gun toting red neck in sight. The Coens deliver their finest masterpiece in the stylings, or is that musings(?), of their classic debut "Blood Simple." The characters that operate within their western bred reality all run on instinct and criss-cross paths until the inevitable, bloody denuemonet, yet as the Brothers `Grimm' often do so well, all the genre conventions and cliches are expertly overturned and reinvigorated by their scripting smarts and visual flair.
This is a beautiful looking, intelligently written and masterfully paced modern classic, the hype from critics around the world is certainly justified in every respect. The slow build suspense simply drips with atmosphere and a sombre foreboding not seen since "Fargo."
The simplistic plot is paradoxically quite complex, especially in the second act, the Coens showing a consistent and remarkable talent for proving that its not the tale itself that entertains, but it's how you tell the tale. It's all about the details. "No Country for Old Men," is laced with wry comic moments that add colour and shading to the characters and story without deflating the drip-feed tension. The dialogue is deceptively effortless, yet highlights how much careful consideration the Coens put into every single line of their wonderful prose.
And the performances! Wow! Rarely can it be said that a movie has no weaknesses in the ensemble chain, but here we get three particularly brilliant, yet extraordinarily different lead performances. Josh Brolin is back on the radar and turns in his finest piece of thesping to date, using the silence and his lack of dialogue to tell us more about Llwelyn Moss than a thousand words ever could. Tommy Lee Jones, ever the veteran, is remarkably understated, showing the restraint and consideration that can only be found with a seasoned pro. But the real kudos must go Javier Bardem. He quite possibly pulls off the performance of the year, and I mean hands down. And remember this is the man who stole a whole movie from under Tom Cruise and Jaime Foxx's noses with one single scene in "Collateral." He is a revelation, personifying pure, unrelenting evil and becoming an adversary even "The Terminator" would have nightmares about. A scene in which he shares with a Gas station clerk is so unnerving and so disquietingly amusing it ranks as one of the best scenes in the film and of the Coen Brothers' long career. If Bardem doesn't get a best supporting Oscar nod for this then there will be blood running in the streets. On top of that trio of marvellous and quite frankly faultless actors, we have Kelly MacDonald, the sexy Scott whose Texan accent is so convincing, I think America might have to adopt her as their own, and Woody Harrelson provides solid, controlled support.
There is no music. Everything is delivered through sound and silence, which conjures a menacing atmosphere familiar to fans of the early Coen days with "Blood Simple." The soundtrack creates a genuine ambience most filmmakers can only dream of invoking proving definitively that silence is golden. And when things do begin to heat up with the stakes constantly rising and confounding expectations (a common trick the Brothers employ) we are treated to some of the most wryly smart dialogue of recent years, while some subtle symbolism, usually evident in most westerns, takes on a mythic dimension in this magnificent motion picture. Occasionally the visuals become almost surreal, gaining a uniquely abstract quality to the action (a bonafide Coen Bros trait). It's very rare I see a film these days that I can immediately trump as a modern classic whilst it unfolds on the screen, even the Coens' last three or so films have been decidedly unworthy of their skills, but "No Country for Old Men," takes the western, the black comedy, the chase thriller and wraps them up into one, sharp, dark and thrilling feast for the eyes. And as for the final twenty minutes (the much debated "bad" third act), it goes to show how modern audiences are so dangerously addicted to being hand-fed climaxes with their blockbuster cereals. "No Country..." says no to all that jazz and instead usurps convention, denies confrontation, confounds expectation and much as the Coens proved with "Barton Fink" demands that the audience accept the ambiguity and denied catharsis as a pro, not a con. I think it is pure genius to undermine and override the western genere cliches. It is not a cheat, but a fresh perspective on an old narrative concept. Kudos to them for having the moxy to do it. Kudos.
Plenty of symbolism, witty dialogue, gripping performances from a faultless cast, a slow burn pace punctuated by bursts of terrifying suspense, and some funny asides that diminish nothing of the intense material on display. Lots of dead dogs too. A masterpiece without exception and probably the best American movie of 2007.
I got here the same way the coin did March 24, 2008
A Flickering (England)
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
This inevitably perfect marriage between Cormac McCarthy and the Coens manifests itself as the final elegy to God, confirming his loss of utility by extracting its own brutal divinity from nature's lawless chaos. Post-"Seventh Seal", it's a sparse masterpiece in absurdism which articulates the insignificance of our conceits, the astonishing, humbling power of our barren cosmos. It's a sea of troubles against which we can't, needn't take arms but merely stand in awe. And it might even be perfect.
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