WWTBAM Bored

I apologize if this is a rehash of a previous thread. Please ignore if so. As if you wouldn't anyway. Come on. Be serious.

Anyway, we watched No Country for Old Men the other night. It was good. We love the Coen brothers. However, it wasn't great. Maybe because I expected it to hit me like Fargo or something.

The actors were all fabulous. Tommy Lee Jones was fabulous. Javier was fabulous, although not having seen the other nominated guys so my opinion is worthless, his performance didn't strike me as particularly Oscar-worthy. I thought Josh Brolin was wonderful. I thought he delivered an Oscar-worthy performance.

This is a thinking movie. I'd like to see it again to appreciate some of the nuances and details. There wasn't a whole lot of humor in it. Much blood, though.

I'd like to see it again to appreciate some of the nuances and details.

Above is pretty much the second thing I said upon leaving the theater. The first thing was "My goodness, my goodness, my goodness."

peacock2121 wrote:I'd like to see it again to appreciate some of the nuances and details.

Above is pretty much the second thing I said upon leaving the theater. The first thing was "My goodness, my goodness, my goodness."

My first thing was "WTF was that"?

kusch wrote:

peacock2121 wrote:I'd like to see it again to appreciate some of the nuances and details.

Above is pretty much the second thing I said upon leaving the theater. The first thing was "My goodness, my goodness, my goodness."

My first thing was "WTF was that"?

What you both said, too. My goodness, WTF.

When the movie first ended, I didn't think it was worthy of an Oscar. But then I started thinking about it, and read some movie forums about its meanings, I appreciated the movie much more.

I recently saw Michael Clayton, and I did not even think it was that good of a movie, never mind Oscar caliber.

I saw the movie in theaters, mainly because I've always liked the Coen Brothers, and I had the same WTF reaction to the ending. Then I read the book, and I was surprised by how much the movie stayed true to the book. I bought the movie on Blu-ray disc the day it came out and watched it again. I appreciated it much more...

Beebs52 wrote: The actors were all fabulous. Tommy Lee Jones was fabulous. Javier was fabulous, although not having seen the other nominated guys so my opinion is worthless, his performance didn't strike me as particularly Oscar-worthy. I thought Josh Brolin was wonderful. I thought he delivered an Oscar-worthy performance.

Jeff and I saw the movie last night.

Tommy Lee Jones' performance impressed me the most. He was incredibly subtle and really was the heart of the movie.

Javier Bardem was totally over the top. Josh Brolin was very good as well, I just knew that when he went back with the water, things would not come to a good end for him.

Did you know that the actress who played Josh Brolin's wife is Scottish, she was in the movie Nanny McPhee. I really enjoyed her performance and would like to think that her character wasn't killed.

goongas wrote:When the movie first ended, I didn't think it was worthy of an Oscar. But then I started thinking about it, and read some movie forums about its meanings, I appreciated the movie much more.

I recently saw Michael Clayton, and I did not even think it was that good of a movie, never mind Oscar caliber.

Michael Clayton joined a list of movies for me in which the performances were great, but the movie itself was just okay.

PlacentiaSoccerMom wrote: Did you know that the actress who played Josh Brolin's wife is Scottish, she was in the movie Nanny McPhee. I really enjoyed her performance and would like to think that her character wasn't killed.

Spoiler

No, I'm afraid she was killed. Chigur checks his boots for blood after he walks out of the house and stands on her porch. And the book makes it crystal clear that she was killed.

But I was watching some of the extras on the disc, and I was shocked at the actress's normal Scottish accent. She pulled off the Texas accent very well in the movie...

What really amazes me about this film was the performance of the bit actors. The great scene with Javier Bardem in the convenience store works precisely because of the half befuddled, half afraid reaction of the clerk. There's another very good scene a bit later in which he confronts the manager(?) of the trailer park where Brolin lives.

It's one thing to get great performances from great actors. I think I could direct Anthony Hopkins or Meryl Streep and they would turn in a solid performance. On the other hand, when you work with nonactors and marginal actors and get a number of memorable scenes from them, that shows real directing talent.

I think Steven Spielberg deserved the Oscar for Saving Private Ryan as much for his work with the actors as the technical work in the beach landing scene. The fact it didn't win Best Picture was a farce. Shakespeare in Love was a film built for actors with a script that rewarded witty performances and a lot of very good actors in the ensemble (Paltrow, Dench, Wilkinson, Rush, Firth, etc.). The actors who played Tom Hanks' squad in Ryan were pretty much non-entities, who did terrific work with a script that wasn't tailored to showcase their acting talents, and if you look at their resumes, other than Matt Damon, none of them has amounted to much since.

No Country was certainly deserving of its, and the Coens' (both for directing and writing) Oscars.