Canberra Milk wrote:I watched No Country for Old Men, and I can't see how that ending can be justified. Absolutely dreadful ending.
I think the point of the ending was the Tommy Lee Jones realises his time has past, and he can no longer fathom the violence, or the motivation for the violence, in his world. He is, if nothing else, a sensible man who understands he is no match for Javier Bardem's character, who is described as being like a 'ghost', and driven by different values to everyone else.
His ramblings were a reference to his voice-over at the start where he talks about his dad being a law-man, and how he loved hearing about the old-timers and their war stories. In his dream at the end he talks about his father riding past him on horseback in the desert, and feeling that one day he'll meet up with his father further along the trail - I think this is meant to be taken that he feels 'finished' and ready to join his old man, not in the sense that he wants to die, but that his purpose in life is over ( he says that he no longer feels he can make a difference).
Its bleak and nihilistic, but I don't see how they could have ended the movie any other way - Javier Bardem's character is such a merciless, brutal killing machine that it would be laughable if TL Jones had defeated him. I think the Coen Brothers were trying to avoid the obvious cliches of the old-timer out for 'one last hurrah' - instead giving the message that America is in the toilet, and the bad guys have won.
Canberra Milk wrote:And Michael, how can you say that Mulholland Drive makes sense after a couple of viewings? Do you mean that every character and scene has a clear meaning? I'm not sure if I see that. I still enjoyed the movie but I don't think it's supposed to make complete sense.
No
Mulholland Drive does not make sense in terms of each character and each sequence making literal sense, but think of it like this - the first part is Naomi Watts'
imagined journey through Hollywood, and from the moment she puts the key into the blue box and the camera swirls inside it, from the point is the story is reality. Thats how the story gets around characters apparently dying and re-appearing as different people etc.