Another classic Cohen brother
movie. Another series of ‘wait what?’
moments. In this movie, No Country for Old Men, the audience
comes face to face with the brutal character Anton Chigurh, played by the Oscar
Best Actor Award winner Javier Bardem.
This character embodies the belief determinism. Continually he confronts victims and gives
them the opportunity to live by calling whether or not the coin he flips is either
heads or tails. What this movie is good
at doing is asking the question of whether or not we have free will or if
everything is pre-determined.
Chigurh’s encounter with the man
who works at the gas station is a prime example for this determinism. Chighurh confronts this seemingly unimportant
gas station owner until he calls heads.
Fortunately for him, Chigurh flipped heads and left him to live. When the man went to put the quarter in his
pocket Chigurh refused to accept this action.
He said he should not put such an important quarter into his pocket and
get it mixed in with all of the ordinary quarters. This quarter was from 1958 and traveled 22
years to save this gas station owner’s life.
J.R. Lucas would find the discussion of this coin problematic and label
it ‘historical determinism.’ It is easy
to see what has happened and find all or most of the causes for an effect. You could trace the history of that coin from
hand to hand, pocket to pocket, and wallet to wallet. You would be able to show how and why that
coin ended up in the pocket of Chigurh at that particular moment. Lucas says it is idiotic to consider that
coin special. One can see how even just
one different action in the past could have altered the place of that
particular coin at that time. It is important
to notice that even though Chigurh calls the coin special, he also says that
even so it is just a coin. Calling his
deterministic view of the coin into question.
When you think the movie is coming
to a climax and a showdown between Llewelyn and Chigurh is about to happen, the
Cohen brother’s leave you saying, ‘wait what?’
Llewelyn is going to go back into his motel room and is tempted by a
woman in a pool. She starts a
conversation with him about drinking beer and then asks why he keeps looking
out of the window. This conversation
leads him to say that he is looking to see what is coming, to which she quips
but no one ever sees that. He declines
her invitation for beer and probably later sex, although it is important to
notice that he could have said yes but because of his will he decided not
to. In the next scene we find out that
Llewelyn is shot and killed by Mexican drug dealers. Although the movie has been primarily
following him, we only learn about it through the story of Sheriff Bell, played
by Tommy Lee Jones. The Cohen brother’s
wanted Llewelyn’s sudden death and conversation to stick in the mind of the
viewer. If he could have seen what was
coming, then he would not have been at that motel or told his wife where he was
going to be. However, he did not and his
death comes as a shock to the audience.
Lucas would agree with this interpretation that of course he did not see
the ‘effects’ of his ‘causes’ ahead of time and therefore would have chosen
otherwise. So it should not be seen in
the reverse that his death was pre-destined because he did not make the right
choice.
In another example of Chigurh’s
deterministic beliefs, the already beaten down and woeful widow of Llewelyn
Moss finds Chigurh sitting in her house after her mother’s funeral. She knows he is there to kill her and tells
him that he does not have to do it. He
responds by saying that everyone says that and that he had already given his
word to her deceased husband that he would kill her. He gives her the option of calling heads or
tails, to which she refuses to respond to and accepts her ‘fate.’ David Hume’s Of Liberty and Necessity offers insight into this scene. Chigurh seems to believe that he has no
choice in the matter of killing Carla Jean, but Hume would argue that he has
will power not to do so. He is therefore
faced with the choice of killing or not killing her. To answer this question best, Sartre responds
that as long as one considers the humanity of everyone in every action, the
choice is up to you (of course this means that Sartre would be opposed to her
killing).
At the end of the movie the Cohen brother’s of
course give you another ‘Wait what?’ moment when Chigurh’s car is hit by
another car. Chigurh has the green light
but is hit and badly injured by the accident.
After all of the choice and will that we have seen in this movie, one
comes up against the question of free will or determinism once again. This time the act seems pre-determined,
because it is so random and yet somewhat redeeming. Hume and I would argue that it is just a
matter of conflicting wills. Both
decided to drive at the same time.
Chigurh followed the laws of the road and the other chose to run a red
light, resulting in the accident. In any
case, the questions the accident posses about liberty and determinism are
fitting for a movie rife with choice and maybe pre-determined effects.This movie is amazing and extremely well done and acted. I always enjoy a good bad guy so if you want to see Javier Bardem at his finest, check this movie out!
