This is following up a post by Tracy a few days ago but I don't know how to start a new thread and address it to anyone but All. (That All! -- he's all over). That's OK because I have a bona fide recommendation this time.
You asked if I had seen "No Country For Old Men". I said not yet but I intended to. Last night the perfect opportunity arose and I jumped on it. Emily has volleyball practice every Wednesday and Thursday evening from 7 to 9:30. It's in Crystal Lake, a half hour drive from here, so there isn't much sense driving back and forth. As it happens there is a cineplex a mile or so from the practice facility. That worked out perfectly and I suspect will continue to do so -- drop her off at 6:45 when they are supposed to be there, catch a movie starting around 7, and be back there by the time practice ends. Beautiful!
Anyway, the movie. I think I told you I liked the book and I liked the movie at least as much. Tommy Lee Jones does some of his best work as the world-weary Texas sheriff whose eyes have seen too much. Various other actors/characters are equally brilliant. But the guy who walks off with the show is Javier Bardem in his chilling portrayal of Chigerh (sp.?), who is as memorable a character as we have had on screen in quite a while.
You (Tracy) didn't say that you had seen it but I assumed you had. What did you think?
Here is Roger Ebert's review:
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071108/REVIEWS/711080304Roger mentions "Fargo" more than once but the Coen brothers movie NCFOM reminds me of most is the one that put them on the map, "Blood Simple". Both are set in Texas, the bleak parts, and feature characters who could cut glass with their flintiness. The moral scenery is as arid as the empty Texas vistas -- every man (and some of the women) for himself, and devil take the hindmost. It's no country for sentimentality.
