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Pascual Valdez

Dr Childs

English 1301

06 December 2012

For The Love of Money

            What would you do if you found a bag full of hundred dollar bills filled to the top, would you keep it or leave it where it is? Or would you feel morally obligated to return it into the proper authorities. If you kept it would you put it to good use or abuse it and spend it frivolously? As Peter Travers of Rolling stone magazine says “Moss takes the cash and runs. Wouldn’t you? That question sets up the film’s moral dilemma and puts us in Moss’ boots.”  (par. 4) In the film “No Country for Old Men” you see various examples of what some people would do for money, some good and some bad. They say that money is the root to all evil. Just like the O’Jays song “For the love of money” says “For a small piece of paper it carries a lot of weight.” Money can drive some people out of their minds and can fool people sometimes. The outcome is certain that money can change people decisions in one way or another it doesn’t matter if your good or bad person.

            Llewellyn Moss is hunting for antelope in the vast plains in West Texas when he is confronted with a life altering choice of taking the bag of money with good intentions.  “Moss finds the money, the means to his retirement, next to the body of the “ultimo hombre” (who, incidentally, no one else in the movie ever appears to find).” (McClure 48) Out of pure luck one day while hunting he stumbles upon a chance that could ultimately change the faith of his course of life forever. “When he opens the satchel and gets his first look at the money- a considerable amount, even at a glance he remains largely unaffected. “Yeah,” he grunts under his breath, thoughtfully affirming that the money isn’t really too much of a surprise.” (Peebles 126) Confronted with the decision to keep the money or leave it was a big turning point in the film. As Tammy Spino says “Moss steals the money he looks around and sees death all around him. Moss knows that this may also be his fate.” (Spino) By taking the money Moss has to change his life style drastically by forcing him and his wife Carla Jean to move putting their life in jeopardy. And now while on the run he has to be on his toes. Everyone who comes in contact with Moss either dies or gets injured. At the brink of death in Mexico Moss hands the mariachi players money in exchange for them to take him to the hospital. “Although Llewellyn steps into a cradle of violence in a bleak and indifferent landscape, he must confront almost immediately an obligation to a transcendent set of moral values, based not on an Enlightenment faith in reason but on a faith in the redemptive power of Christ’s sacrifice.

(McFarland 169)

            Forced with a life or death situation there is no telling what one might do when confronted with this but to offer money to buy your life and safety back. Carson Wells is the hired contract killer to find and murderous Anton Chigurh for a nominal fee. When he finds Moss he tries to make a deal with him, offering to keep him alive in exchange for the 2 million dollars. As Carson Wells tells Moss “You can’t make a deal with him, even if you gave him the money, he might kill you just because you inconvenienced him. Indeed, he is a peculiar man, with principles that transcend money or drugs or anything like that.” Knowing that he could really care less about Moss he tells him what he wants to hear so he can take the 2 million dollars for himself. After Anton Chigurh finds him in the hotel he is afraid of dying so, and his tone quickly changes in the face of death. With a shaky voice he wants to buy his life with money so Chigurh won’t kill him, he even offered to tell him where the satchel filled with the 2 million dollars is.

            Even though Anton Chigurh is contracted to locate the satchel full of 2 million dollars he goes to great lengths to do so by exterminating any and everyone who gets in his way for his pay. When he finds out that there were other people that were hired also to go after the money he eliminates the competition. Because he believes himself to be “the one right tool” he gets insulted that other people were employed to retrieve the money he goes to the source and kills the main investor. With the flip of a coin you get heads or tails a fifty fifty chance with one’s life is put on the line. Even though having principles to get through life as guidelines, people still make excepting for being currency motivated. Though he is receiving a sum of money he kills his bosses for the money. At the hotel while tracking the money he kills the Mexicans in there room.

            Greed is such an ugly trait but goes hand and hand with the envious sought after prize called money. To some people it’s the one thing worth fighting and risking life and limb to obtain it with any means necessary. But unfortunately with these risks comes a hefty price to pay, for every action there’s a reaction. And the price and misfortune that was paid was the death of Carla Jean, Llewellyn Moss’ wife. The selfish acts that Moss took had a dire effect on the life of his wife in more ways that he could ever imagine without him even knowing it. In the end what it came down to was the final show down between Anton Chigurh and Carla Jean. Her faith was sealed because of everyone’s selfish acts of greed. After losing her husband and burying her mother she comes home and notices an open window in the house. It was as if she knew what was in the room waiting for her. Boiling down to the last conversation Anton says “your husband had the opportunity to save you.” Thus proving, her husband’s selfish acts to keep the money. As Chigurh flips the coin he says “this is the best I can do, call it” to her this was an inane comment, how could a coin determine the outcome and fate of another human being life is what she was getting at. Brandi Curl says in her bloog “Carla Jean refusing to make the choice to play the game forced Chigurh to take reasonability for his own actions. The choice not to play did cost her life but expose Chigurh as not a prophet of fate but as a killer.” (Curl)  To some people it’s the one thing worth fighting for; the one thing worth dying for, but it brings nothing but pain when they go in search of quick fortune and fame.

            The group of boys walking on the border bridge seemingly appear to be concerned about Moss’s injury until he made he offered to purchase one of the boys jacket for $500 dollars, after seeing the money there concerns turn into greed. It was evident greed set in when Llewellyn told the other boy to give him the beer and the boy give a smirk as says “how much?” After witnessing an almost a horrific and deadly accident the younger boys at the end of the film seem willing to accept the money given to then in exchange for their silence. The boys approached Anton in the street to see if he was ok. Even through near death experiences the boys were willing to remain silent for money and not tell the authorities. Weather its death, greed, or simply reacting to the situation what some people do for money is impossible to understand as Mary P. Nichols says “Human beings do not simply confront death, they confront the incomprehensible, the unintelligible.” (Nichols 208)

            Willing to kill for money is one of the choices that cross the mind of some individuals. The Mexican drug dealers will do anything for money so they are willing to kill anyone who stands in their way to get their hands on the money. Doing whatever it takes to get the money, whether it’s to kill or not to kill people such as innocent by standers. “In the novel, the reader is told that one of the Mexicans grabs the girl by the hair, points his gun at her head, and tells Llewellyn that he will kill her if he does not lay his weapon down.” (McFarland 170) Using innocent by standers is one leverage strategy that drug dealers use in order to get what there after in this case the satchel of money. The only down fall of being a dealer is as Sheriff Ed Tom Bell says “these boys died of natural causes, natural to the line of work there in.”

            Money, currency, cash, assets, funds whatever you want to call it ultimately in the end it changes the outcome of peoples perspectives and choices they make because of it. As they say “money is the root of all evil,” it is evident that there is truth to that saying. Like it or not what people do for money has an everlasting effect on their lives and the ones around them.

                       

Works Cited

No Country for Old Men. Dir. Ethan, Joel Coen. Perf. Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, and        Josh Bardem. Miramax/ Paramount Vintage, 2007. DVD.

McClure, Christopher. No Country for Old Gods. Perspectives on Political Science 39.1 (2010):    n. pag. Web. 28 Nov. 2012.

Peebles, Stacey. “Hold Still: Models of Masculinity in the Coens’ No Country for Old Men.” No Country for Old Men From Novel to Film. Ed. Lynnea Chapman King, Rick Wallach,          Jim Welsh. Lanham, Md: Scarecrow Press, 2009. 124-138. Print.

McFarland, Douglas. “No Country for Old Men as Moral Philosophy.” The Philosophy of The      Coen Brothers. Ed. Mark T. Conard. Lexington: UP of Kentucky, 2009. 163-175. Print.

Travers, Peter. “No Country for Old Men.” Rolling Stone.Com. Reviews, 1 Nov. 2007. Web. 07   Dec.2012.

Spino, Tammy. “Fear and Fate in No Country for Old Men.” Blooger. Blooger.com. 25     November 2012. Web. 8 December 2012.

Curl, Brandi. “Choice and Consequence in No Country for Old Men.” Blooger. Blooger.com. 8   December. 2012. Web. 8 December 2012.