The Real Danger in ‘No Country for Old Men’ Isn’t What You Think

The Big Picture

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• No Country for Old Men, a neo-western film directed by the Coen brothers, explores the emptiness and meaninglessness of life through its characters.
• The protagonist, Llewelyn Moss, faces the consequences of his greed after finding a suitcase full of money, while Sheriff Bell struggles to find purpose in his job.
• Anton Chigurh represents the chaos and unfairness of life, as he emphasizes the role of chance in determining outcomes, ultimately leaving viewers contemplating the unpredictable nature of existence.

Using the genre of a neo-western, the Coen brothers‘ No Country for Old Men encapsulates, through its three main characters, the feeling of emptiness and hammers home the point its title so curtly dictates. Exemplifying the wonder for purpose and meaning of man’s existence, the picture instead makes its viewers wallow in their own dread, showing that the world is going too fast for them to keep up no matter how hard they try. In the bleakness of its storytelling and its utter lack of a score, Joel and Ethan Coen blast the audience with this painful truth – life is no more than a frustrating endeavor that leaves these characters no choice but to traverse its meaninglessness. No Country for Old Men‘s characters force the viewers to revel in the mere absurdity of both the film and their everyday lives. This story leaves a void inside their hearts and minds that’s perpetually left open for the buzzards to feast.

No Country for Old Men tells the story of Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) who by sheer luck, finds a suitcase full of money in the middle of a freshly made crime scene. Unbeknownst to him, the case has a tracking device, and a psychopathic hitman Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) is hired to recover it. As these events progress, the county Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) is left to examine the carnage in its wake and is constantly puzzled by its gravity. In the midst of the chilling terror brought upon by Chigurh, Moss, and Bell are at the mercy of the angel of death. Chigurh is the symbolic vulture flying over stragglers in the middle of the desert, waiting for them to give up and just fall down.

What Happens to Llewelyn in ‘No Country for Old Men’?

Llewelyn is given a great blessing through pure luck, one that seems to bring a swift resolution to what is understandably everyone’s problem: finding a way to feed his family. However, Llewelyn soon understands that this lucky occurrence is one that carries a lot of baggage. In a disastrous move, he decides to go back to the bloody crime scene to give the last surviving man a drink of water. Consequently, Llewelyn encounters a group of men finding the lost suitcase, and he gets injured while trying to escape. Not only that, the suitcase’s transponder alerts Chigurh like a dog hearing a ringing bell. Perhaps as a way of responding to his lucky day and as what any person experiencing a good day would do, Llewelyn wants to give back to the person responsible for his new fortune. In a cruel twist of fate, though, it immediately throws a haymaker of a reminder to the audience: even luck has a price. It further embellishes man’s frustration with life’s absurdity and drives us to somehow feel for Llewelyn. While he is initially presented as a despicable character, especially since he refuses to show any mercy for a dying man who just wants to quench his thirst, this shift becomes an endearing quality. This change of heart hitches us to Llewelyn’s daring escape from a very dangerous individual.

As the film progresses, we see Llewelyn desperately trying to hold on to his treasure, while Chigurh systematically looks for his prey. In the ensuing pursuit which shows the stoic killing machine, Chigurh, cutting through people like butter, the viewers are confronted with a question: should Llewelyn have not taken the parcel? We all know the answer to this one. Yes, he shouldn’t have taken it, but it is what any man would do in a life that constantly breaks down their silver lining. Why wouldn’t you say yes to a bag containing millions of dollars that could drastically change the way one lives? Life would still be utterly meaningless, but one will definitely have an easier path than others. However, it is in Llewelyn’s inevitable death that enlightenment occurs. It is what we do with our luck which will define our future. Llewelyn was foolish enough to take the cash, but it would have served him well to inspect the parcel before he took it home. His greed, which was definitely borne out of necessity, came to cost him. Life played a joke on him, and his bleeding body only proved to be the punchline.

For ‘No Country for Old Men’s Sheriff Bell, Purposeless Is a Fate Worse Than Death

While this roaring rampage burned endlessly, Sheriff Bell was merely left to observe the ashes. There is only so much one man can do after all, let alone a county sheriff that’s near retirement. During its entire runtime, Bell is unfortunately lost in the shuffle. Every step of the way, he fails to catch a break, to grab the figurative brass ring of capturing this individual. He is representative of a person whose purpose in life is also what destroys him. The fact of the matter is that Bell is like a geriatric talking to his grandchildren failing to understand their trends, and staring in awe at what technology they are fiddling with. While that thought may be comforting, the old sheriff does not get that pleasure. Bell’s conversation with Ellis (Barry Corbin), asks him and the audience how exactly can they defend against the barrage of a man who has no fear. The audience does not have to answer that question, and neither does Bell. It is a notion that’s unacceptable since it is his job to understand what to do. The unmerciful waves of time have ravaged his physical body, his competence, and his abilities. It is a truth that’s hard to accept, and in arguably the most pivotal scene of the whole picture, he tries to go against this fact.

After having coffee with Ellis, Bell goes back to the motel where Llewelyn was killed by Chigurh and begins to investigate. It is an impulsive move that is driven by pure pride. Bell’s ego couldn’t take the pain. He takes all of his might to challenge this idea of growing too old for the job. He arrives and takes a gander at the broken doorknob, and it is made to appear that Chigurh is behind the door. We see the fear and the hesitation in Bell’s face as he takes out his weapon, and almost surrenders to the thought that this might be his last rodeo. The nervous sheriff opens the door, but the room is empty. As he takes a seat on the bed, Bell sees an air vent opened with a coin, hinting that Chigurh has escaped through this passageway. In the ensuing sigh of relief, Bell realizes that he gets to ride another day. It is at this moment, and in his subsequent conversation with Ellis, that he realizes that the threat is too great for him to handle. The times have violently left him in the dust, and Bell finally accepts. It is the most difficult pill to swallow for him and for every person in the world to find their purpose in their work. The only thing that gives their lives meaning is leaving them behind before a whiff of accomplishment reaches their senses. It is a sad fate to bemoan, one where the clock and the calendar become enemies. Father time is indeed undefeated. Bell may have escaped the clutches of the Grim Reaper, but the feeling of purposelessness is a fate much worse than death.

What Does Anton Chigurh Represent in ‘No Country for Old Men’?

Anton Chigurh on the other hand is what represents the chaos and absurdity of life, and he teaches us that there is only one true determinant of fairness in all of it: chance. When he encounters a rather snoopy man at the cash register of a store, Chigurh grows worried that he might talk. The madman flips a coin and asks his victim to call it, which the cashier does successfully. Chigurh, in a rare instance of showing emotion, gladly asks the man to keep the coin branding it as lucky. With Llewelyn, he asks him to drop the money, and in exchange, Chigurh forgets about everything. Instead of taking the chance, Llewelyn’s greed takes over reason, and he pays a heavy toll.

In his situation with Bell, Anton chooses to escape rather than confront and overpower the old sheriff. Chance once again extends his hands to a very fortunate man who gets the better end of the stick. Interestingly, with Llewelyn’s wife Carla Jean, Chigurh is astounded at her refusal to call the coin toss, and we are left not knowing whether she was killed. Taken altogether, it is a representation of the sheer volatility of chance. One does not know if their day will be good or bad. It is a fate that everyone gets to experience, and it is what is ultimately fair. It is only right to do everything a person can to chase the ever-elusive dreams, but the results will never be determined based on one’s efforts. Like the unknown result of a coin toss, chance does that for you whether you like it or not.

In its suspenseful reflections and its cliffhanger ending, No Country for Old Men emphasizes its title’s duality. It is representative of either a man dying for his failure to make the right choices, or of a person knowing it is time to let things go. Whatever becomes of Chigurh is not important. Knowing that he is alive, lingering around our surroundings is what’s essential. The angel of death, carrying with him chance in the form of a coin toss is a worrying thought that viewers bring home. Will we get to encounter him in our everyday existence? That would entirely depend on how the meaningless wheels of chance roll.

No Country for Old Men is streaming on Showtime in the U.S.

Watch on Showtime