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4.05 AVERAGE
4.05 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
It is rare for me to prefer an adaptation over its source material, but it is my understanding that No Country For Old Men was always built to be on screen at some point. That is apparently why it reads so differently from the viscerally descriptive prose in Blood Meridian or The Road, which are the two books I note here because they are the only other McCarthy books I've read.
Something about this one felt like summation of everything people love about McCarthy; like a greatest hits run. Like if you asked a chat bot to write a Cormac McCarthy book, it would make this, because it is just so quintessentially Cormac. I don't mean that to say the book isn't interesting or original, because it is. I am giving it four stars after all. It just felt like a lot of road I had tread before. The hyper-violence, the almost anti-Western backdrop, the long and contemplative paragraphs.
Anton Chigurh feels so much like the Judge from Blood Meridian, and that was such an iconic character that nothing could have ever lived up. Except, in the movie, he really does. Javier Bardem's take on the character's personality and the visual design the Coen brothers went with has become embedded in cinema history in a way I just don't think the book counterpart is.
Even still, I was shocked at how similar the book was to the film. Outside of a single major plot thread near the end, almost everything remained intact in the movie in some form or another. I think it speaks to the quality of the text that it translated to pitch perfectly to screen. Had I not watched the movie first I think I may have been even more attached to the book. These themes of losing your hold of a world that just isn't yours anymore, and the terror of watching a new generation creep up on you that you could never hope to understand, are so interesting to explore in a neo-western like this.
I like the movie better, but this was a great read.
Something about this one felt like summation of everything people love about McCarthy; like a greatest hits run. Like if you asked a chat bot to write a Cormac McCarthy book, it would make this, because it is just so quintessentially Cormac. I don't mean that to say the book isn't interesting or original, because it is. I am giving it four stars after all. It just felt like a lot of road I had tread before. The hyper-violence, the almost anti-Western backdrop, the long and contemplative paragraphs.
Anton Chigurh feels so much like the Judge from Blood Meridian, and that was such an iconic character that nothing could have ever lived up. Except, in the movie, he really does. Javier Bardem's take on the character's personality and the visual design the Coen brothers went with has become embedded in cinema history in a way I just don't think the book counterpart is.
Even still, I was shocked at how similar the book was to the film. Outside of a single major plot thread near the end, almost everything remained intact in the movie in some form or another. I think it speaks to the quality of the text that it translated to pitch perfectly to screen. Had I not watched the movie first I think I may have been even more attached to the book. These themes of losing your hold of a world that just isn't yours anymore, and the terror of watching a new generation creep up on you that you could never hope to understand, are so interesting to explore in a neo-western like this.
I like the movie better, but this was a great read.
This book is one that will stick with me for a very long time. There aren’t many words I could write that would do it justice. It’s a classic, timeless must read for anybody and everybody.
dark
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
imagine my shock when i realized that this book was going to be less than 20 chapters…
Normally, McCarthy's strict adherence to the Hemingway style and reverence for the myth of the Western man that drips from every McCarthy sentence gets old for me pretty fast, but No Country for Old Men was pretty great. The Coen Brothers pretty much took the book and shot it line by line, too.
"Nie chodzi o to, że wiesz czy nie wiesz, gdzie jesteś. Chodzi o to, że wydaje ci się, że możesz znaleźć się w nowym miejscu, nie zabierając niczego ze sobą. Przecież tak sobie wyobrażasz nowy początek. Każdy tak sobie wyobraża. Ale nie można zacząć od początku. O to chodzi. Każdy zrobiony krok jest zrobiony na zawsze. Nie można się niczego pozbyć. Niczego."
"Na jedną wojnę byłem za smarkaty, na drugą za stary. Ale widziałem, co się z tego narobiło. Można być patriotą i dalej uważać, że niektóre rzeczy kosztują nas więcej, niż są warte. Spytaj matek poległych żołnierzy, ile ich to kosztowało i co za to dostały. Zawsze przepłacamy. Zwłaszcza za obietnice. Nie ma czegoś takiego jak obietnica z rabatem. Przekonasz się. Może już się przekonałeś."
"Na jedną wojnę byłem za smarkaty, na drugą za stary. Ale widziałem, co się z tego narobiło. Można być patriotą i dalej uważać, że niektóre rzeczy kosztują nas więcej, niż są warte. Spytaj matek poległych żołnierzy, ile ich to kosztowało i co za to dostały. Zawsze przepłacamy. Zwłaszcza za obietnice. Nie ma czegoś takiego jak obietnica z rabatem. Przekonasz się. Może już się przekonałeś."
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
dark
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gun violence, Violence, Mass/school shootings
Moderate: Drug use, War
Minor: Animal death