《No Country for Old Men》老无所依

No Country for Old Men is a 2007 American thriller¹ written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, based on the Cormac McCarthy novel of the same name. The film stars Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem and Josh Brolin, and tells the story of an ordinary man to whom chance delivers a fortune that is not his, and the ensuing cat-and-mouse drama, as three men crisscross each other's paths in the desert landscape of 1980 West Texas.

 

When a Vietnam veteran discovers two million dollars while wandering through the aftermath of a Texas drug deal gone horribly awry², his decision to abscond³ with the cash sets off a violent chain reaction in a stripped-down crime drama from Joel and Ethan Coen. Llewelyn Moss⁴ (Josh Brolin) has just stumbled into the find of a lifetime. Upon discovering a bullet-strewn pickup⁵ truck surrounded by the corpses⁶ of dead bodyguards⁷, Moss uncovers two million dollars in cash and a substantial load of heroin⁸ stashed⁹ in the back of the vehicle. Later, as an enigmatic killer¹⁰ who determines the fate of his victims with the flip¹¹ of a coin sets out in pursuit of Moss, the disillusioned¹² Sheriff Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) struggles to contain the rapidly escalating¹³ violence that seems to be consuming his once-peaceful Lone¹⁴ Star State town.

 

The film premiered in competition at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival on May 19, and commercially opened in limited release in 28 theaters in the United States on November 9, 2007, grossing $1,226,333 over the opening weekend, and opened in the United Kingdom (limited release) and Ireland on January 18, 2008. It became the biggest box-office hit for the Coen brothers to date, grossing more than 170 million dollars worldwide, until it was surpassed by True Grit¹⁵ in 2010.

 

No Country for Old Men appeared on more critics' top ten lists (354) than any other film of 2007, and was the most selected as the best film of the year. It is regarded by many critics as the Coen brothers' finest film. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times called it "as good a film as the Coen brothers...have ever made," The Guardian¹⁶ journalist John Patterson said"that the Coens' technical abilities, and their feel for a landscape-based Western classicism reminiscent of Anthony Mann and Sam Peckinpah, are matched by few living directors," and Peter Travers of Rolling Stone said that it is "a new career peak for the Coen brothers" and is "as entertaining as hell".

 

Among its four Oscars at the 2007 Academy Awards were awards for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay, allowing the Coen brothers to join the five previous directors honored three times for the same film. In addition, the film won three British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA) including Best Director, and two Golden Globes. The American Film Institute listed it as an AFI Movie of the Year, and the National Board of Review selected the film as the best of 2007.

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