Coen Brothers Final Day Four: No Country for Old Men

5. Of all the films by the Coen Brothers, No Country for Old Men seems to be the most "serious." It lacks the characteristic irony or ironic detachment (expressed through forms of comedic parody and satire) that we have come to expect from the Coens. Comparing No Country with other Coen films, describe this difference and provide possible explanation for this apparent departure from their usual approach.


While No Country for Old Men certainly lacks the pervasive sense of ironic detachment consistent in other films by the Coen brothers, there are elements of the film that provide a degree of comedic relief for audiences. In part, the removal of the typical “Coen-esque” removal of seriousness is done with respect for Cormac McCarthy’s novel, and may also reflect a fundamental shift in Joel and Ethan Coen’s world-view between O Brother Where Art Thou and their more recent efforts. With that in mind, there are two consistent portrayals of character “types” in the Coens’ films that provide some modicum of humor in No Country for Old Men.

The Coen brothers have consistently navigated towards atypical portrayals of law enforcement agents in their films; as early as Raising Arizona, Joel and Ethan create a dubious distinction between what it means to be “good” and what it means to be “evil.” No sooner has H.I. McDunnough met Ed than they begin a protracted courtship, one that ends with marriage. And yet, Edwina (the police officer) is the one who suggests that H.I. (the recidivist criminal) kidnap one of Nathan Arizona’s quintuplets. Despite being the representative of all that’s “good”, Ed instigates a crime that sets the narrative to Raising Arizona on its course. Similarly, the police in Miller’s Crossing are as complicit in the mob dealings as the criminals, the police officers in Barton Fink and The Man Who Wasn’t There are alternately autocratic and bullying, and scenes involving the police in The Ladykillers, Burn After Reading, Fargo, and A Serious Man are designed to be more humorous than sincere.

Similarly, the Coen brothers have a great difficulty in conceiving characters that represent “pure evil” seriously. Whether the loathsome Loren Visser, the ultra-violent Leonard Smalls, the psychotic Charlie Mundt, The effeminate Dane, the devil incarnate Sheriff Cooley, the frog crushing Big Dan, the nefarious Professor G.H. Dorr, or the silent hit man Gaer Grimsrud, the Coens are incapable of playing evil as anything other than ironic. Despite their horrific actions, each incarnation of “evil” that the Coen brothers include in their films is undercut by some exaggerated aspect of their character, rendering them slightly comical, be it Smalls’ free market capitalist dealing, Mundt’s glee as he literally brings hell to Barton Fink, or Grimsrud’s fascination with soap operas.

When considering this, No Country for Old Men’s portrayals of “good”, epitomized by Sheriff Ed Tom Bell, and “evil”, embodied in Anton Chigurh, are both played less than seriously during the middle of the film. While it is true that the lasting images of Bell come from his narration at the beginning and the recollection of his dream that close the film, both underscoring his dread of a future devoid of the morals of “the good old days,” for much of the film Bell is the source of many chuckles, delivered with deadpan by Tommy Lee Jones. His own fear of Chigurh is hidden early in the film by humor, either delivered in action (entering Moss’ trailer behind his deputy) or in lines like “Alright. What do we circulate? Lookin’ for a man who recently drank milk?” Bell is also willing to bend the truth in order to scare Carla Jean into contacting Llewelyn on his behalf. When she asks if Bell’s story about the cattle slaughter is true, Bell responds “Who's Charlie Walser? Oh! Well... uh... a true story? I couldn't swear to every detail but it's certainly true that it is a story.”

Comparably, Anton Chigurh is not able to completely escape the Coen brothers’ tendency to undermine pure evil, even if Chigurh has an almost Jason Vorhees ability to transcend pain. The moves are subtle, but giving Chigurh a Prince Valiant haircut and asking Javier Bardem to deliver the lines as softly as possible simultaneously provide quiet laughter at his behavior and underscore the threat he poses when Anton stops speaking and begins killing. That being said, certain behavioral patterns in Chigurh – his insistence on the coin toss, a fear of dirtying his feet, his overly courteous demeanor to his victims – are accentuated by the Coen brothers in the film in order to undercut him ever so slightly. In this way, Joel and Ethan are able to retain their ability to gently mock forces of evil without deviating greatly from McCarthy’s novel.

The serious nature of No Country for Old Men is, however, telling of some undisclosed shift in perspective about human nature the Coens have undergone. O Brother Where Art Thou? reaffirmed a basic faith in goodness (with some sarcastic underpinnings about politicians) and is the clearest “happy” ending this side of The Big Lebowski or Raising Arizona. While The Man Who Wasn’t There ends suggesting that Ed Crane might not be untrustworthy, there is still an affinity for the protagonist to the end. Even Intolerable Cruelty and The Ladykillers end with good ultimately triumphing over evil, but No Country for Old Men presents a world when evil is coming from every angle, and no hope is in sight.

Subsequently, the Coens revisited the “crime committed by idiots” motif in Burn After Reading, a film that reasserted their ironic detachment and sarcastic attitude towards authority figures. On the other hand, the film also brutally murders the only two genuinely “good” characters, Chad (Brad Pitt) and Ted (Richard Jenkins) and affirms the selfish wishes of Linda Litzke (Frances McDormand). The film is fundamentally cynical about human nature in a way that is consistent with No Country for Old Men’s encroaching evil, and the film was met with a cool response from critics, who found it to be too mean spirited.

A Serious Man also seems to question the validity of living a “good” life, suggesting that because Lawrence Gopnik questions his series of unfortunate events, he deserves the punishment to follow even more. Although A Serious Man is far more ambiguous than Burn After Reading, there is nevertheless an underlying distrust in the “fellow man” that goes deeper even than in Miller’s Crossing. There is no relish in Gopnik’s dilemma, no detachment that allows us to laugh with or at him. The humor instead comes from the various sources of authority he turns to, which are unreliable (a consistent theme with the Coens). It remains to be seen if True Grit will reflect this “new” direction of the Coen Brothers, but it appears that the failure of Intolerable Cruelty and The Ladykillers may have impacted Joel and Ethan in ways only apparent onscreen.