No Country For Old Men wins first major prize of 2007 Oscar season
Story by Jack Foley
JOEL and Ethan Coen’s No Country For Old Men has officially kicked off the awards season by picking up four awards, including Best Film, at the 2007 National Board of Review of Motion Pictures (NBR) Awards.
The dark thriller, starring Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin and Javier Bardem, took best film of 2007, best adapted screenplay (for Joel Coen and Ethan Coen), best ensemble cast and career achievement in cinematography (for Roger Deakins).
Based on the acclaimed novel by Pulitzer Prize winning American master Cormac McCarthy, No Country For Old Men picks up as Llewelyn Moss (Brolin) finds a pickup truck containing a stash of heroin and two million dollars in cash, surrounded by a sentry of dead men.
When he takes the money, he sets off a chain reaction of catastrophic violence that not even the law – in the person of aging, disillusioned Sheriff Bell (Jones) – can contain.
As Moss tries to evade his pursuers – in particular a mysterious mastermind who flips coins for human lives (Bardem) – the film simultaneously strips down the American crime drama and broadens its concerns to encompass themes as ancient as the Bible and as bloodily contemporary as this morning’s headlines.
Other NBR awards
In announcing its annual awards, the NBR also shortlisted its 10 best films of the year, not including the best film recipient.
These included: The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Atonement, The Bourne Ultimatum, The Bucket List, Into the Wild, Juno, The Kite Runner, Lars and the Real Girl, Michael Clayton and Sweeney Todd.
George Clooney was named best actor for legal drama Michael Clayton and Britain’s Julie Christie was named best actress for her moving portrayal of a woman with Alzheimer’s disease in the Canadian film Away From Her.
Tim Burton took the best director prize for his musical Sweeney Todd which reunites him with Johnny Depp and Pixar comedy Ratatouille was deservedly named best animated feature.
The Affleck brothers, Ben and Casey, also triumphed – the former taking the best directorial debut for his thriller Gone Baby Gone, which has yet to receive a UK release date, and the latter for best supporting actor for his performance in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.
Breakthrough awards also went to Emile Hirsch, of Into The Wild fame, and Juno stars Ellen Page.
The best foreign film award went to The Diving Bell & The Butterfly, a French biopic based on the memoirs of a hospitalised stroke victim, while Romanian Palme d’Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days, about an illegal abortion, was included in the NBR’s top five foreign films of the year.
A career achievement honour was also presented to Michael Douglas.
The NBR’s members include teachers, historians and film industry professionals and their prizes are seen as a useful indicator of which films might fare well throughout the remainder of the awards season.
A further insight will be provided when the next round of awards are announced by critics’ groups from Boston, New York and Los Angeles next week. Then, on December 13, this year’s Golden Globe nominations will be announced.