Can somebody explain the end of this film to me? I thoroughly enjoyed it up to the closing scene - and then felt as though there'd been a power-cut or something as the ending was so unexpected.

Does it end with the baddie getting hit by a car? I think he then walks away, to show that he is invicible, some sort of evil force, the devil, etc. Not sure really. Can't remember the film very well. Bring on The Road.

Tori

My take on this.....I wanted to review this but got side-tracked. So forgive me for using your question as an excuse to revisit the film a little.

I guess the end sequence begins where Anton (Bardem) goes to see Carla Jean, after Moss's funeral. As he stands outside her house it is left uncertain whether he has killed her: did she stick to her determination not to call his 'life/death-toss' coin - if so he killed her; he has made it clear earlier, in death or life you can't refuse to 'play'. If she called wrong he killed her. But if she called right like the gas station guy, he didn't. That uncertainty is of the essence of the ironic existential tone of the whole movie. In a random world, the only control is in choices we make. The narrative of the whole film is driven by people who make choices: Anton to do his job which is his way of life; Harrelson's Carson Wells to do the same job but for whom it is just a job; Moss who chooses to change his life by stealing the money. All the other characters in the film are dragged along helplessly in the wake of these 'choosers'. (Which makes Lee Jones's Sheriff Bell the key character - for he is in but not of this violent, heartless, value-less world).

You will recall Anton then gets in his car, and driving safely in the suburbs, how dangerous can that be, is smashed into by a car that runs a red light. An 'accident' but one with human choice that brought it about - running the light was as also a 'gamble' with death like calling the 'life/death' coin. And a choice that may kill someone else. In a way the 'choice' Anton gives peple is more honest - the car driver takes the risk pretending he isn't, kidding himself. Anton makes the choice absolutely clear. Seriously injured he asks for help from the two boys horrified at the sight of the bone sticking out of his arm. He offers to buy one boy's shirt and still insists on paying for it when the boy out of natural concern says he doesn't want paying. In Anton's world there is always a price - to pay and to be exacted. Anton is utterly and terrifyingly consistent throughout - he has chosen the life a killer. Yes he gets paid, that is an ethical value to him. But killing is his life not just a job - unlike Carson Wells when he tries to do a deal with Anton to save his life.

Anton is a pure existential force and a philosophically challenging one: there is just this world; it is in the end totally random with only one certainty - death. It is a world of facts. There are no values in the world, except those we create through our choices and our actions. If we confront that proposition head on then it follows we must choose, and not choosing is a choice as well. This is why it is philosophically challenging - just like Anton's coin it follows we can choose to be 'good' or 'bad'. And Anton just chose to do what he does, what we call 'bad' - and do it better than anyone else.

This sets up the emotional complexity of the final scene. We have gathered throughout the film that Sheriff Bell is tired and worn down by trying to deal with the pointless, violent, increasingly heartless world he sees every day. If pushed one suspects that his only definition of 'good' would be to fight against 'bad'. After a lifetime in but not of the world of crime from petty misdeameanours to organised slaughter, he is tired, this is not a battle you win - it is a life you choose knowing you can't win. Unlike narratives, stories, there is no 'ending' happy or otherwise. Turning our lives into narratives, stories, is one of the illusions with which we comfort ourselves to cope with a random world.

And so in the final scene we see Bell retired, free at last from the daily exposure to the worst of human behaviour. And we realise that in gaining his freedom - he has lost his purpose. He has lost the very thing that drove him on each day - to try to make things a little better for others by getting rid of those who hurt, exploit etc their fellow human beings. He's lost. If Anton is the 'death' side of the coin - Ed Bell is the 'life' side. And deep down Bell knows Anton and those like him are still out there..... How does sitting on the front porch or even going for a ride waiting for old age and death, compare? He knows Anton will never give up: so how does he feel about himself for doing so? Typically for the Cohens - they leave those questions hanging in the air - to resonate a while after leaving the cinema.

The film reminds me of the fable of the scorpion and the dog: a scorpion and a dog stand by a raging river. They both need to cross. The scorpion says

"will you carry me over on your back?"
"No way" the dog replies, "you'll sting me and I'll die."
"Why would I do that?" the scorpion says "if I sting you then I will drown too."
So the dog lets the scorpion get on his back and half way across in the raging current - the scorpion stings him. The dog cries out uncomprehendingly,
"WHY did you do that? Now we will both die." The scorpion replies,
"It's what I do."

Anton to the 'T'.

(The fable is sometimes rendered "It's in my nature" but I much prefer the above version).

Sorry to go on so long - just a very interesting film.

regards

Z

Excellent review, thank you.

But I still don't find much of interest in a character that is utterly bad, whether by choice or not. Surely all sane people believe themselves to be good and doing what they perceive to be right at some level, however twisted the justification.

Still, I bow to your far deeper insight into a film that I saw as wonderfully shot and certainly gripping, but not much more than that.

I was disappointed with this film after reading The Road, which knocked me across the room.

Thanks Rod

I agree in many ways. I'm not a great fan of the Cohens in general. Oddly there are some strong qualities that Anton has when considered aside from context (which is a bit weird I know) i.e.

- He is almost indifferent to his own pain or even his fate. He, like the scorpion, does what he does.

- Though we like to think of violent people as bullies and/or cowards, whatever else we may think of Anton it is hard to think of him as either in the normal sense. we cannot imagine him for one second, begging for his life.

- Sick though it seems and we have seen this in other movies - he takes a pride in being good at being bad so to speak. Sloppiness or even lack of skill would make him angry with himself - perhaps a little like a hunter who is a good shot, messing up a kill shot so that the animal is only wounded and escapes to die painfully and at length.

- He will always see his task through - whatever the obstacles, however risky. And if that seems equally immoral and unappealing (and it does to me) I suspect there are many military people who would regard these as highly prized qualities in a combat soldier.

- He is totally without sentimentality or deference.

However if we see Anton's function in the movie as to create simply an impersonal force of evil, though that doesn't make him interesting, what he brings out in the other characters is interesting:

- Moss is independent, courageous and not afraid even of Anton

- Clara Jean's courage in refusing to play his stupid game is courage of another stripe altogether.

- Carson is shown up as just a cheap hood.

- Anton's pure force of evil underpins why Sheriff Bell will always regret his retirement. Anton, like the evil he represents is always with us.

Regards

Z

Zettel,

All cogent points. Nice work. You make me almost admire the guy. Nearly all of Anton's virtues as you list them are my faults. Apart from sloppiness, that is. I particularly liked that point of yours. It echoes back to the opening scenes when Moss (is that right, I didn't even remember the character's names?) maims the stag he is hunting. You've upgraded the film for me and I will watch it again.

Have to go now: get out and do some cold-blooded killing to wipe up all that sentimentality that swamps me.

Rod.

Excellent review and feedback - thank you.

With several days behind me since I saw the film I can enjoy the points it deftly made about good and evil, and courage too. Clara-Jean appears as a gullible person, almost vacuous in her beleif in 'her man' but the courage she showed during the confrontation with Anton towards the end showed stregnth far and away above that of her weak willed husband. Anton was played with such meticulous determination it was hard not to admire him, to almost seperate what he did from how he did it. It's been a long while since I experienced such tension in a film.

I can see now that 'closure' at the end of the film would have been disrespectful to the characters, particularly Bell whose sentiments are reflected in most officers who enforce the law, but see that justice isn't always served. Logical ending to a great film - thanks for helping to put some perspective on it for me.

Tori/Rod

Any time - my pleasure. Glad it helped. Gave me an excuse to put something down about a film I missed reviewing. Thanks for that.

By the way - in all the fuss about NCFOM the other film with Tommy Lee Jones - In The Valley Of Elah got passed over. His performance there is even better than NCFOM and though that one does 'round-off' the narrative it is still beautifully played and serious in intent. Well worth catching if pops up on a 'reprise' screen anywhere near you. If not DVD or Sky etc one to look out for.

regards

Zettel

Thanks Zettel

hat one must've passed me by, but I'll certainly look out for it now.