The Smelly Cheese

Spoiler alert!!! Highlight to read. I get that he's supposed to represent death, although as a metaphor for death he did seem kind of vulnerable. If he is supposed to be a true harbinger of doom, shouldn't I at least be able to understand his dialogue. And this totally wasn't about his accent. I'm almost absolutely certain that they slowed down his voice in post production (trust me I do that stuff for a living). If that was the intention I get that. But if you're going to make your main character play evil incarnate at least have the few words that he does say be audible to most humans. Or is that part of the whole shtick? Your not supposed to understand death when it comes for you? I call shenanigans!! If death is a character in your movie that is relentless, omniscient and invincible then he better be able to communicate properly. Otherwise he's just a crazy hitman with a bad haircut and thick spanish accent. End spoilers.

Apparently from some emails I've received I should read the book No Country for Old Men, to make sense of the film. To this I also call shennanigans! The ending of this movie made sense to me, I got the themes and the allusions. There's some stuff in the middle that just flat out looked like bad editing or poor directorial choices. Here's a hint if you're going to kill a pivotal main character in a suspense "cat and mouse," film don't have that character die "off screen," leaving your audience wondering what the hell happened. It's even worse if you then ask the audience to re-focus their attention on another ancillary character who turns out actually to be "the main character." If you're going to adapt a novel into a screenplay don't hide behind "being faithful to the novel." You're movie has to stand on its own merit.

I'm getting real tired of crazy serial killer characters being metaphors for death. First off don't real-life crazy fucks get enough attention already. Is there not enough death and mayhem going around these days? I fast forwarded through most of the Oscars last night, because in large part it's just a bunch of overpaid actors and directors sitting politely in ridiculously expensive clothes verbally masturbating with each other over how wonderfully complex and rich their "art" was during the past year. I really like the Coen brothers film's, but am I really gonna learn anything about mortality or morality from a couple of New York Jews that went to film school? No offense boys, I loved "Fargo," but you're opining about "life and death," seems a bit trivial when men half your age are getting shrapnel lodge in their asses in the middle of the desert.. for realz.