Quote:
Originally Posted by shrinkboy
well said, fotno. well said. fate is undoubtedly the major theme of mccarthy's writing, and he does it in a way that illustrates the impersonal nature of fate acting through the human host.
i like to think of fate in this way: we connect ourselves to our fate when we act with what the greeks called hubris i.e. the sense of pride which allows one to believe that he can overcome the consequences of going against what he knows to be wrong. in this case, moss unleashes the furies on himself when he takes the money. an act of hubris if there ever was one. he has now locked himself together with chigurh.
the other face of fate is destiny. my destiny is what i discover when i refuse the selfishness of taking on what cannot be overcome. my true self emerges and i am drawn to become what i truly am. if i bring the fates down on myself, then that can never happen.
one is doom, the other salvation. and this is the realm that all of mccarthy's work dwells in. if anyone's read The Road, then we get a relentless, utterly bleak, fate blasted world that ends with a grace note of salvation. an utterly miraculous, sparse, almost impossible to accept, yet nevertheless there it is fleeting vision of the world beyond this.
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The courage it takes as an artist (no matter the medium), to attack these themes is immense. Those artists willing to rise to the occasion, and not blink or look away at that last moment, create work that is powerful in a way that convention can never be.
I would hope that there's always a place in film for everyone's tastes, but thank goodness there are a few filmmakers that are willing to break down the fourth wall and stand convention on its head.
I find it ironic that for all Hollywood likes to believe it's on the cutting edge of art and fashion, film is truly the last bastion of conservative artistic thinking.
These same barriers were knocked down in the visual and musical arts, hundreds of years ago. By remaining locked into the traditional (and predictable) antagonist/protagonist relationship, film has limited itself.
Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, this staid formula is why the the theaters stand empty so frequently, and why, when we enter a theater we can comfortably assume the following:
The top-billed actor/actress will likely survive.
The "bad guy" will be easily recognizable, as will the "good guy".
The story arc will follow one of a handful of archetypes.
In the end, good will win out, even if our hero doesn't survive.
When a film breaks out of these comfortable conventions, it takes the risk of either being misunderstood, despised, or both. When they succeed (as I believe NCFOM does) they become films that stay with the viewer for a lifetime.