Cast overview, first billed only: | |||
Tommy Lee Jones | ... | Ed Tom Bell | |
Javier Bardem | ... | Anton Chigurh | |
Josh Brolin | ... | Llewelyn Moss | |
Woody Harrelson | ... | Carson Wells | |
Kelly Macdonald | ... | Carla Jean Moss | |
Garret Dillahunt | ... | Wendell | |
Tess Harper | ... | Loretta Bell | |
Barry Corbin | ... | Ellis | |
Stephen Root | ... | Man who hires Wells | |
Rodger Boyce | ... | El Paso Sheriff | |
Beth Grant | ... | Carla Jean's Mother | |
Ana Reeder | ... | Poolside Woman | |
Kit Gwin | ... | Sheriff Bell's Secretary | |
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Zach Hopkins | ... | Strangled Deputy |
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Chip Love | ... | Man in Ford |
In rural Texas, welder and hunter Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) discovers the remains of several drug runners who have all killed each other in an exchange gone violently wrong. Rather than report the discovery to the police, Moss decides to simply take the two million dollars present for himself. This puts the psychopathic killer, Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem), on his trail as he dispassionately murders nearly every rival, bystander and even employer in his pursuit of his quarry and the money. As Moss desperately attempts to keep one step ahead, the blood from this hunt begins to flow behind him with relentlessly growing intensity as Chigurh closes in. Meanwhile, the laconic Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) blithely oversees the investigation even as he struggles to face the sheer enormity of the crimes he is attempting to thwart. Written by Kenneth Chisholm (kchishol@rogers.com)
I don't remember being so scared in a movie theater since "Don't Look Now" Here the Coen Brothers take everything a step further with exhilarating ease. The terror was genuine and not because we were rooting for Josh Brolin or anybody in particular. The terror was personal, Joel and Ethan Coen made that terror visceral and tangible. It has to do with our own nightmares. Josh Brolin was a perfect piece of casting because in a way he doesn't have many personal colors. He's one of the bunch, one of us and we could put ourselves in his shoes. That is the art of film narrative expressed in a way that we've never experienced before. I heard people old enough to have seen Hitchcock's "Psycho" in the theaters and what glued them to the screen was their own fear. Well, that's what I've experienced here. Javier Bardem is superb, considering that he's the reason for the fear. He carries a human/inhuman kind of strength and we know he'll get us, sooner or later and if we consider the ending of the film, he might still do. Worthy Oscar winners, all of it and all of them.