No Country for Old Men - Analysis

No Country for Old Men is a 2007 crime thriller adapted for the screen and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, and starring Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, and Josh Brolin. Adapted from the Cormac McCarthy No Country for Old Men, it tells the story of a botched drug deal and the ensuing cat-and-mouse drama, as three men crisscross each other's paths in the desert landscape of 1980 West Texas. The film examines the themes of fate and circumstance which the characters face.



This film is famous for the representation of the main character who is the killer who seems to be not affected by his violent actions and devastation he causes. This is sickening and the audience get to see the murders he comits and follow him though he trail to find what he is looking for. The whole of the killing is not shown explicitly to the audience, the audience will know what is goin on but some things are not shown so that the audience are made to think about what is goin on. An example of this is when he goes into a hotel room where he shoots everyone in there, we do not see all of these killings. In one case there is a man in the shower and he closes the shower curtain before firing to kill the man. Here the audience does not see everything but this is not needed as we know how brutal the main character can be.

The scene above shows the superior character of the killer, and even though he is going to kill many people and has just, he is calm and undisturbed by any of his actions. The audience here know what the character is capable of as we get to know him but the man behind the counter has no clue, which creates tension and makes the audience feel uneasy about the situation.

The conversation between the two characters appears to be normal but for the audience watching who know he has just killed people it is very uneasy to watch. With simple questions like 'what time do you close' the killer seems to have the upper hand on every situation as he then goes on to tell him 'you dont know what your talking about'.

The camera shots used here are just two shots, over the shoulder shots, and reverse angle. The simplicity of the shots does not matter here because the audience are drawn into the narrative and are wondering what will happen next.