No Country and Ketchup

Megan and I saw No Country for Old Men today, and loved it. The Coen brothers are at the top of their game on this one, and it's not like they were slouching before. The two protagonists, Llewelyn (Josh Brolin) and Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones), are both men of the land, sun grizzled Texans who seem at home on a horse with a rifle in their hands. Though Jones and Brolin never have a scene together in the movie the two are linked. Both are not men from this era (the film takes place in the 70's) but old western style cowboys living in a world that has no use for survival skills or horse sense.

Javier Bardem plays Anton Chigurh, a detached, murderous, and forceful man. We first meet him as he brutally strangles the officer that's arrested him with the chain of his locked handcuffs. From there he's off on the road, leaving a trail of bodies everywhere he goes. But there is no glee in his murder, no malice or anger. He doesn't kill for any purpose other than he thinks he should. Bardem wears the role well, and keeps the character menacing at all times by never breaking from the casual emotionless way he kills others. If Anton looks the same way buying eggs at the grocery store as he does shooting a bystander in the chest, then watching him buy eggs does not mean that murder isn't seconds away.

As much as I'd like to go on and on, I don't want to ruin any more of the film. The end is one of the best endings I have ever seen, and the movie manages to grow into something much bigger and more beautiful than I could have expected. Go see it.

We also watched some of the stupidest crap I've ever seen when we got home. Megan was looking up reviews of the Runaway Bunnies book that Laura mentioned in her latest blog. What we found was expotv.com. On this site regular people make terrible, boring reviews of products that should never ever need to be reviewed... like ketchup. Rule for makigng your own review seem to be the following:
1) Hold up what you're talking about the whole time!
2) DO NOT write a script or pracice!!
3) You do not need to finish the book before reviewing it!!!
4) Review sometimes mean walking around describing the room you're in!!!!
5) If you forget what you're talking about, look at the thing you're reviewing for a while!!!!!
6) Please DO NOT consider what you're wearing or where you are when filimg!!!!!!
7) Please keep your voice small, emotionless and stuttery!!!!!!!
8) NEVER FORGET to say "I liked it," "I really liked it," and "it's good" (or pretty good)!!!!!!!!
9) DO NOT TOUCH EDITING SOFTWARE EVER!!!!!!!!!
10) Do not consider the ramifications for shilling anything you can think of!!!!!!!!!!

Enjoy.