No Country for Old Men

First Hit: This was a powerful and somewhat disturbing film.

The Coen brothers make films that move beyond telling tales conventionally.

This film is no different. We are introduced to each of the main characters by way on tonal scenes. Tommy Lee Jones plays Sheriff Bell who has spent his entire life as a peace officer as was his grandfather.

The tone set here is that he is smart, astute, and has seen a lot. He notes that the times, people and the crimes are changing and he is about finished as a law man.

Josh Brolin plays Llewelyn Moss who is in tune with the open Texas country and is a determined man who finds his ticket to financial freedom when he comes across a drug deal gone bad. His conscious is conspicuous when he lies awake the first night after finding the money, gets up, and takes a gallon of water back out to the crime scene to give to the only half-dead survivor. You know that he cares and it is his downfall.

Javier Bardem, plays Anton Chigurh the psychopathic killer out to retrieve the money and doesn’t let anyone or anything get in his way. He is singularly focused and at times very eerie as emotion and feelings rarely are given light through the blank almost dead eyes.

These three characters play their scenes separately and with different deftly crafted tones until near the end when Llewelyn and Anton share a brief gun battle.

As the film winds down each of the characters are given their exit which exemplifies their character.

Overall: In general I liked the film, however pacing was somewhat problematic to me as there were two times my eyes left the screen and looked around at the other audience members wondering how they were receiving this film.

Shoot 'em Up

First Hit: Everyone shooting everyone everywhere including themselves in the foot.

Why would Clive Owen do this film?

It was slightly entertaining at times for its un-worldliness and bizarreness with super sliding via an oil slick and another one in the bathroom. Killing reigns in this film with at least 100 dead bodies laid about the film frames.

There isn’t much else to say about this film as the plot is meaningless, the dialog, occasionally clever, and lots of shooting; hence the title: “Shoot ‘em Up.

Overall: Don’t waste your time and money.

Death Sentence

First Hit: What happened? It could have been a good action/thriller if we were given the psychological path of Kevin Bacon’s decline. We weren’t and what we got was a mess that ended so poorly it made me laugh.

The film begins fairly well with pictorial snippets of how the family was close.

We didn’t spend enough time there. We didn’t learn why Kevin cared so much or his wanting to create a safe and secure life for himself and his brood.

Short glimpses of him at his job making sense of insurance risks help, and are only part of the picture. We didn’t learn enough about the second, younger son, who wasn’t the “golden boy” of the family and who turns out to be a more important part of the picture.

What we got were tasters and quick visuals then graphic violence. I did like John Goodman’s character and it made sense that his son was the “bad boy” of the film.

The worse part, which brought most of the audience to laughter, was the next to ending scene where both protagonists end up sitting on a church pew, together and wounded.

Overall:  This could have been a good film but John Wan didn't understand the importance of setting up the plot then go to a crisp action ending. Instead he couldn't wait to bring us the action and we're left wondering why.

Bourne Ultimatum

First Hit: Go see it. A good, fun, entertaining film if you like action.

This film fit well with the previous two films and I’m glad to say it will go no farther. Some sequels/prequels need to know when to stop and this one does. It’s over. The ride was excellent.

Matt Damon is perfect for the role in that he looks youthful and yet there is an age quality to him as well. In other words, he is believable for the role.

The action sequences are well scripted and play out in a satisfactory way. However, some of the other sequences were not as believable. I don’t think Jason Bourne would have been able to look through a single lens portable binocular, through two sets of glass in the midday sun and read the cover of the top secret document. There was just no way to do this at the angle presented in the film.

To make matters worse the director chose to present, to the audience, an angle showing the cover of the document in a way Jason Bourne would not have been able to see. The views were incongruent with the available information and therefore diminished the scene.

There were a couple of scenes like this and I think Paul Greengrass would have known better than to attempt to fool us this way. However, the worst part of this film, for me, is the shaky camera. Lose it or at least tone it down by 2/3.

I don’t think this adds to the action nor do I like how I get distracted by it. A filmgoer does not want to be distracted by what is on the screen. They want to be brought into the film. The last bit of criticism would be to the Albert Finney role.

Although I like Albert, I didn’t like that he looked older in the look back scenes than in the current time scenes. I think makeup would have made this sequencing better understood.

The other actors play well in this film, especially Julia Stiles and Joan Allen. David Strathairn is good however there was an un-believability to his role that didn’t quite work for me. However, it doesn’t take much away from the film as it is about Jason Bourne and the newly minted killers out to execute the orders to kill him.

I loved his interaction with Julia Stiles and then there is the ending. Perfect, I loved the scene in the café with her smile. It tells the whole story.

Overall:  A wonderful action film because the characters worked and the scenes match the action.