Rijksuniversiteit Groningen
Redefining the American Masculine:
An Examination of the Influence and Subversion of the Cowboy and the Detective in Cormac McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men and Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain
Kirsten Walley
S2337843
Dr. Elena Gualtieri, Professor of Modern English Literature and Culture
20 August 2013
Table of Contents
Introduction………3
Chapter 1: Identifying the Western and Hard-Boiled Detective Influence....….………...6
Chapter 2: Subverting Gender Expectations in Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men……….………..…17
Brokeback Mountain and the Cowboy Masculinity
The Role of Women
Chapter 3: Subverting the Genre………41
Conclusion………...47
Introduction
Cormac McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men and Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain are two texts difficult to categorize according to modern genres. The texts merge classic elements of the western and hard-boiled detective with contemporary characters who manage to both reinforce genre stereotypes and subvert them into something entirely different. In his essay “The Law of Genre,” Jacques Derrida argues: “a text cannot belong to no genre, it cannot be without or less a genre. Every text participates in one or several genres, there is no genreless text; there is always a genre and genres, yet such participation never amounts to belonging” (65). No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain both participate in the genres of the western and the hard-boiled detective, but both texts further that participation with the creation of characters that reflect contemporary America, its people, and ideals while subtly undermining the conceptions of masculinity created by the cowboy and detective.
The brilliance of McCarthy and Proulx’s texts is in their ability exploit the vision of the American hero and how it has changed. Both texts manage to subvert
preconceptions about American masculinity and gender roles perpetuated by the western and hard-boiled detective. No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain both rely more heavily on the influence of the western and on the questions the western seeks to answer, “all Westerns seek to define what it means to be a hero. This hero is the
and masculinity were often considered synonymous with good and the ability to
overcome the obstacles that stand in the way of justice. No Country for Old Men subverts this expectation with the idea that this traditional form of masculinity can be reincarnated in the villain and that the hero’s masculinity may be in question. Without a happy ending and the preservation of justice, McCarthy’s novel distances itself from the prototypical western.
Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain seeks not to answer what it means to be a hero, but simply what it means to be a man and whether masculinity and homosexuality are two mutually exclusive entities,
If the new common wisdom that hotly overt homophobes are men who are
“insecure about their masculinity” supplements the implausible, necessary illusion that there could be a secure version of masculinity (known, presumably, by the coolness of its homophobic enforcement) and a stable, intelligible way for men to feel about other men in modern heterosexual capitalist patriarchy (Sedgwick 84). Ennis del Mar and Jack Twist are two cowboys whose homophobic upbringing causes them to question their own masculinity in the face of their love for one another. Brokeback Mountain questions whether or not two men, both the picture of cowboy masculinity, can overcome the disgust toward homosexuality that has been indoctrinated into the western mentality.
No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain seek to reinforce the idea of an American masculinity, but one beyond the limitations of the cowboy or the detective. Both the cowboy and the detective represent the same type of traditional, steadfast
Chapter 1: Identifying the Western and Hard-Boiled Detective Influence
“It is generally accepted that the two quintessentially American genres are the western and the crime novel and that the latter takes the moral, political and
psychological preoccupations and mythic forms of the former into the urban setting of the twentieth century” (Cant 244). The acceptance of these two genres as ‘quintessential American genres’ speaks to each genre’s ability to define and characterize America. Beyond the conventional settings, characters, and plots typical to these two genres is each genre’s ability to create a perspective and provide insight into the America of the time in which the novels are set. More than just being representative of the American culture, the western and the hard-boiled detective genres also influence culture: they serve as tangible reminders of the ‘American dream’ and the ideals it encompasses. These two genres were able to be both reactive to a changing American culture and to exert an influence over that culture. Westerns and hard-boiled detectives represent two very different but highly stylized portrayals of America that are pervaded by cultural and historical references to the America they were set in. Westerns and hard-boiled detectives remain an integral part of the foundation of American literature, found throughout works representative of modern America and of America’s past.
The western and hard-boiled detective take place in two distinct settings: the expansive American West versus gritty, urban America. Both settings represent two moments of opportunity in America’s history, albeit very different moments,
understood […] To some it constituted a personal legacy especially set for the individual; others saw it as a national heritage to be used, if ever, in a collective sense. For most it was something held in trust for one’s children or perhaps for future generations, but nonetheless an inheritance that somehow would come in handy on that inevitable rainy day (Athearn 10-11).
The West was seen as an escape from the mundanity of everyday life, but an escape that most people did not believe they would ever use. The West was an idea, while the urban setting found in crime novels was very real. Whereas the West is described as pure and limitless, the urban environment is often slightly claustrophobic and unappealing,
The city wasn’t pretty. Most of its builders had gone in for gaudiness. Maybe they had been successful at first. Since then the smelters whose brick stacks stuck up tall against a gloomy mountain to the south had yellow-smoked everything into uniform dinginess. The result was an ugly city of forty thousand people, set in an ugly notch between two ugly mountains that had been all dirtied up by mining. Spread over this was a grimy sky that looked as if it had come out of the smelters’ stacks (Red Harvest 3-4).
Despite the grim descriptions of the urban settings within the hard-boiled detective genre, the city was still considered to be a place of opportunity where people could make a name for themselves. Though that possibility was often associated with crimes like bootlegging and other illegal ventures, the opportunity to create something from nothing existed in the city nonetheless. Unlike the idyllic West, urban America was tangible to many.
dirty, but it affords characters security. Where the West is open and leaves everything exposed, the urban environment allows characters to hide both literally in No Country for Old Men and to hide their identities as in Brokeback Mountain. Only in the open
environment of the West is the truth exposed, making it both a dangerous and appealing setting.
Similar to the distinctions in settings, outward appearances of the cowboy and detective may lead one to believe that there are few if any similarities between these iconic characters. However, these two characters are similar in many respects in regard to their mentality, demeanor, and the ways in which they interact with supporting
characters. The cowboy and the detective are often outsiders to the setting in which the novel takes place; this status as an outsider manifests itself in different ways within either genre. In Zane Grey’s classic western Riders of the Purple Sage, the novel’s protagonist Lassiter is an unwelcome gentile in the Mormon community who finds himself
immediately at odds with Elder Tull, the novel’s chief antagonist,
“Here, stranger, this’s none of your mix,” began Tull. “Don’t try any interference. You’ve been asked to drink and eat. That’s more than you’d have got in any other village on the Utah border. Water your horse and be on your way.”
“Easy—easy—I ain’t interferin’ yet,” replied the rider. The tone of his voice had undergone a change. A different man had spoken. Where, in addressing Jane, he had been mild and gentle, now, with his first speech to Tull, he was dry, cool, biting. “I’ve jest stumbled onto a queer deal. Seven Mormons all packin’ guns, an’ a Gentile tied with a rope, an’ a woman who swears by his honesty! Queer, ain’t that?” (Grey 10)
This handsome, ungrammatical son of soil had set between us the bar of his cold and perfect civility. No polished person could have done it better. What was the matter? I looked at him, and suddenly it came to me. If he had tried familiarity with me the first two minutes of our acquaintance, I should have resented it; by what right, then, had I tried it with him? It smacked of patronizing: on this
occasion he had come off the better gentleman of the two. Here in flesh and blood was a truth which I had long believed in words, but never met before. The
creature we call a gentleman lies deep in the hearts of thousands that are born without chance to master the outward graces of the type (Wister 10).
The reference to the Virginian as a true gentleman by the narrator, a more educated and worldly man, strikes at the heart of the cowboy, a man whose character is defined by his actions rather than his background. This observation holds true not only in Wister’s novel, but also for the general characterization of the westerner,
This particular West, or set of Wests, […] bred a special kind of people who were almost more American than the Americans they had left behind. Bud Guthrie wrote of this, saying that space breeds its own kind of man. He did not think the westerner was necessarily better or worse than the person who grew up in a heavily populated area, but he felt that the result was a freer, more open, friendlier type. Guthrie’s westerner did not tend to be suspicious; he was democratic and had a sense of humor; and he philosophically accepted the climatic extremes that were doled out to him as an aid or a detriment to the immediate task at hand (Athearn 228).
The cowboy was a product of his background and the environment around him, he adapts. This description of the cowboy lends itself well to Raymond Chandler’s
description of the hard-boiled detective’s character as a man not a detective, which can likewise be extended to include the cowboy, in his essay The Simple Art of Murder,
Chandler’s description along with Wister’s assertion about a true gentleman emphasize the similarity at the heart of the cowboy and the detective, that they were realization of what the American man should be: masculine, independent, and honorable.
Typical to both the cowboy and the detective is a reserved, taciturn nature creating an air of mysteriousness around the character. They prefer not to discuss their past or personal lives and instead remain focused on the task at hand. Often the only real glimpse into the interiority of these characters comes through their relationship with the novel’s women, whether they are a femme fatale like Velma in Raymond Chandler’s Farewell My Lovely or an innocent like Molly Woods in The Virginian. The character of the cowboy and detective alike are emphasized by the stereotypical supporting female characters; the courage and bravery of the cowboy through the fragility of the damsel in distress and the cleverness of the detective through the deceptive nature of the femme fatale. This ability to characterize the cowboy or detective figure through the texts’ other characters is not lost in Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men, where the protagonists of either text are defined by their interactions with the other characters.
use quotation marks to identify dialogue, creating the sense of an internal monologue, similar to those Marlowe would carry out in his own head. McCarthy also defies many of the rules of modern grammar and punctuation, emphasizing a realness in his characters, whose speech reflects actual dialogue rather than something that feels contrived. The style of the dialogue while reminiscent of the hard-boiled detective uses colloquial language derived from the western genre,
Llewelyn aint done nothin. It’s not me he’s in trouble with. Who’s he in trouble with then? Some pretty bad people.
Llewelyn can take care of hisself. Do you care if I call you Carla? I go by Carla Jean.
Carla Jean. Is that all right?
That’s all right. You dont care if I keep on callin you Sheriff do you? Bell smiled. No, he said. That’s fine.
All right.
These people will kill him, Carla Jean, They wont quit. He wont neither. He never has (McCarthy 126-127).
The absence of quotation marks allows the dialogue to flow in a way that is more real, a conversation one hears rather than reads. McCarthy’s characters do not use
wouldn’t mind herdin. I wouldn’t mind sleepin out there.” “That ain’t the point. Point is, we both should be in this camp. And that goddamn pup tent smells like cat piss or worse” (Proulx 259). Both McCarthy and Proulx use language that is familiar and accessible while remaining an integral aspect of the characters and settings of their respective texts.
No Country for Old Men is filled with terrain typical of the western but follows a storyline made famous by the hard-boiled detective genre. The setting is a blend of the expansive West with the violence and seediness reminiscent of a neo-noir Los Angeles or Poisonville,
He was abroad in the morning at first light walking the streets and making notes in his head. The pavement had been hosed off but you could still see the bloodstains in the concrete of the walkway where Moss had been shot. He went back to Main Street and started again. Bits of glass in the gutters and along the sidewalks. Some of it windowglass and some of it from curbside automobiles. The windows that had been shot out were boarded up with plywood but you could see the pocks in the brickwork or the teardrop smears of lead that had come down from the hotel. He walked back to the hotel and sat on the steps and looked at the street (McCarthy 146-147).
Through elements like the setting and characters the novel blends the two most emphatically American genres,
[…] No Country for Old Men is a crime novel; its cars, automatic weapons, motel rooms, corporate offices and city locations are the province of the genre
developed by Chandler, Hammett, Cain, Ellroy and given cinematic form as film noir and its derivatives. But the Sheriff and his deputies, the hunter Moss, the riders on horseback and the landscape of desert, plain and river are, of course, elements of the Western and the Southwest is the quintessential location of its mythic history. In this as in other respects the novel is a hybrid (Cant 240). While Cant is certainly correct in his assertion that No Country for Old Men is a hybrid, he fails to realize that the novel goes beyond hybridity, it does not simply pay homage to the western and hard-boiled detective genres. No Country for Old Men as well as
severely less idealistic and infinitely more realistic. With McCarthy and Proulx’s texts there is no longer a single, definitive idea of what masculinity is. The definition has changed and both texts reflect this change through their development of masculinity in contrast to the masculinity honed by the cowboy and detective characters.
The plot of McCarthy’s novel opens with Llewelyn Moss hunting for antelope and a description of the Texan landscape that sets the stage in a classic western manner, “Somewhere out there was the shadow of Moss himself. He lowered the binoculars and sat studying the land. Far to the south the raw mountains of Mexico. The breaks of the river. To the west the baked terracotta terrain of the running borderlands” (McCarthy 8). In harsh juxtaposition of this serene environment is Moss’ discovery of a drug deal gone wrong where the innocence of the west and the landscape that symbolizes it are bloodied and disfigured by crimes more closely associated with the plots of the hard-boiled detective genre. This is the first instance where the influences of the western and the hard-boiled are present within the same scene and it sets the tone for the entirety of the novel. Despite the vastness of the Texan landscape, it does not offer Moss the protection he needs to hide from Anton Chigurh. Instead Moss tries to find this in cheap motels while on the run,
They drove out to a place called the trail Motel and Moss got out with his bag and the document case and paid the driver and went into the office. A woman was sitting watching television. She got up and went around behind the desk.
[…]
He got the key and walked down to the room and went in and shut the door and set the bags on the bed. He closed the curtains and stood looking out through them at the squalid little court. Dead quiet. He fastened the chain on the door and sat on the bed. He unzipped the duffel bag and took out the
Moss seeks refuge in motels rather than trying to hide in the plains of Texas. This
decision clearly reflects a hard-boiled influence. The protagonists of western novels most often find their solace through nature. In Riders of the Purple Sage, Lassiter and Jane seek refuge in Surprise Valley, a natural hiding place found in the canyons of Utah. Whereas in the hard-boiled detective Red Harvest, the Continental Op knows he is being watched and, rather than choosing to flee, decides to hide by switching hotels under a pseudonym while still keeping his previous hotel room. The situation of the Continental Op is very similar to that of Moss, both know they are being watched but cannot leave. Moss is forced to make do with his surroundings rather than having the freedom that the West usually offers its protagonists. The location of these motels along the Mexican-American border further reinforces the influence of the hard-boiled detective in the setting of No Country for Old Men. The urban crime scene has infiltrated the purity and serenity of the West. Most of the novel’s action in this setting takes place either at night or before daybreak giving the novel an ominous and apprehensive tone when in the urban environment. The action taking place in the urban spaces of the novel all revolve around money, violence, and being hunted. There is nothing serene or even pleasant about these parts of the novel, they only serve to further emphasize the corrupt nature of the urban environment. There are no redeeming qualities to be found in these places.
truck, bought a bottle of whiskey and within twenty minutes were in the Motel Siesta jouncing a bed. […] The room stank of semen and smoke and sweat and whiskey, of old carpet and sour hay, saddle leather, shit, and cheap soap” (Proulx 267). The sour
description of the room reflects the undesirability of the predicament that Ennis and Jack find themselves in: without the protection of nature, the two cannot be together except in filthy places like the motel. The western setting represents freedom and the opportunity for genuine happiness; the urban environment represents hiding, lies, and disappointment. It is clear that these two cowboy-like figures need the sprawling West in order to achieve a feeling of comfort with their relationship that they will never be able to achieve
elsewhere.
Chapter 2: Subverting Gender Expectations in Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men
The subversion of classic elements of the western and hard-boiled detective genres is most evident in Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men’s male characters. Proulx and McCarthy both go beyond the limitations of the cowboy and the detective with characters that have a realness that the cowboy and detective never could and whose definition of masculinity does not subscribe to that of the western or hard-boiled detective. Just as the expectations of a happy ending have been subverted by reality so too has the assumption that masculinity is restricted to those falling into the cowboy or detective stereotypes. Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men both subvert gender expectations with their insightful look into the realities of the iconic American hero: the cowboy. Through the use of characters with a foundation in the iconic, hyper-masculine cowboy Proulx and McCarthy are able to realize the
‘Brokeback Mountain’ and the Cowboy
The influence of the western is found throughout Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain and readily seen in the short story’s setting and language. However, where Brokeback Mountain starkly differentiates itself from its western predecessors is through its two protagonists and the homosexual relationship they have with one another.
Brokeback Mountain employs common characteristics of the western genre but subverts them into something reflective of the problems and concerns of the contemporary American West, often being antagonistic toward the classic western. Proulx’s story challenges western stereotypes of masculinity to create a something that redefines the American West and its hero the cowboy. In so doing, Proulx’s text pays homage to a genre at the heart of the foundation of American literature while examining its flaws and shortcomings through characters that are entirely western but, at the same time, rebuke the genre’s limitations.
One of the most tantalizing aspects of the American West was the freedom that it represented on both a physical and spiritual level. The West was often viewed as an escape and the ultimate opportunity to redefine oneself and capitalize on the ‘American Dream,’
a sense of an entirely new kind of country, uniquely marked by social, economic and spatial openness. Common to all, too, was the related notion […] that the United States was a sacred-secular project, a mission of world-historical
significance in a designated continental setting of no determinate limits. […] The overall result in the United States, at any rate, was a dynamic orientation focused on westward expansion (Stephanson 28).
This led to the great Western expansion of the mid 19th century, which gave birth to the
West offered was a key theme of the western genre, which capitalized on the idea that a man could achieve in the West what would not have been possible in the East. This freedom refers primarily to the ability to become a landowner and to exercise the rights that are associated with being self-sufficient. To the cowboy that was not interested in owning his own land, the West still provided endless opportunities both for work and for adventure. If America was viewed to be the land of opportunity, the West was this notion realized.
Brokeback Mountain subverts these notions of the American West with a story that focuses more on limitations than on freedom. These feelings of restriction and inability are found in several aspects of the text but always relate back to a lack of freedom for the protagonists, Ennis del Mar and Jack Twist, “Both narratively and visually, Brokeback Mountain is a tragedy about the specifically gay phenomenon of the “closet”—about the disastrous emotional and moral consequences of erotic
self-repression and of the social intolerance that first causes and then exacerbates it”
others. This freedom, however, is perverted by the presence of Joe Aguirre, who unbeknownst to Ennis and Jack watches them,
There were only the two of them on the mountain, flying in the euphoric, bitter air, looking down on the hawk’s back and the crawling lights of vehicles on the plain below, suspended above ordinary affairs and distant from tame ranch dogs barking in the dark hours. They believed themselves invisible, not knowing Joe Aguirre had watched them through his 10 x 42 binoculars for ten minutes one day, waiting until they’d buttoned up their jeans, waiting until Ennis rode back to the sheep (Proulx 262).
This period of freedom is only possible because Ennis and Jack believe they are alone and that what happens on Brokeback Mountain is a one-time thing. This feeling is emphasized by the necessity both Ennis and Jack feel to clarify what it is that they are doing with one another,
They never talked about the sex, let it happen, at first only in the tent at night, then in the full daylight with the hot sun striking down, and at evening in the fire glow, quick, rough, laughing and snorting, no lack of noises, but saying not a goddam word except once Ennis said, “I’m not no queer,” and Jack jumped in with “Me neither. A one-shot thing. Nobody’s business but ours” (Proulx 262). It is their inability to move past the homoerotic events of that summer, either by forgetting one another or truly being together, that hinders their chances at freedom. Despite the fact that Ennis and Jack both marry women and have children they are imprisoned by their feelings for one another as well as the knowledge that those feelings can never be fully acted upon. This powerlessness to move on keeps the two men from experiencing the freedom that the West is meant to represent; they are imprisoned by their memories and incapacitated by their love for one another.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. It ain’t goin a be that way. We can’t. I’m stuck with what I got, caught in my own loop. Can’t get out of it. Jack, I don’t want a be like them guys you see around sometimes. And I don’t want a be dead. There was these two old guys ranched together down home, Earl and Rich—Dad would pass a remark when he seen them. They was a joke even though they was pretty tough old birds. I was what, nine years old, and they found Earl dead in a irrigation ditch. They’d took a tire iron to him, spurred him up, drug him around by his dick until it pulled off, just bloody pulp. What the tire iron done looked like pieces a burned tomatoes all over him, nose tore down from skiddin on gravel.”
“You seen that?”
“Dad made sure I seen it. Took me to see it. Me and K.E. Dad laughed about it. Hell, for all I know he done the job. If he was alive and was to put his head in that door right now you bet he’d go get his tire iron. Two guys livin together? No. All I can see is we get together once in a while way the hell out in the back a nowhere—” (Proulx 270).
The imagery of the dead man is stark; a man murdered for, in the eyes of society, not being a real man, with a tool that represents masculinity in both form and function. It is abundantly clear that this is Ennis’ nightmare and that he will sacrifice his happiness to avoid it. Although Ennis and Jack maintain a relationship over the course of the short story, Ennis is always reluctant to commit to anything and this reluctance is a direct result of his fear of discovery by his family and by society who would not see the love that these two men have for one another as anything but disgusting and perverse. This fear comes full circle in Ennis’ mind when he learns of Jack’s death:
Ennis didn’t know about the accident for months until his postcard to Jack saying that November still looked like the first chance came back stamped
“DECEASED.” He called Jack’s number in Childress, something he had done only once before, when Alma divorced him, and Jack had misunderstood the reason for the call, had driven twelve hundred miles north for nothing. This would be all right; Jack would answer, had to answer. But he did not. It was Lureen and she said who? Who is this? and when he told her again she said in a level voice yes, Jack was pumping up a flat on the truck out on a back road when the tire blew up. The bead was damaged somehow and the force of the explosion slammed the rim into his face, broke his nose and jaw and knocked him
No, he thought, they got him with the tire iron (Proulx 279).
Though Jack’s death clearly causes Ennis a great deal of pain and regret it also frees him from the fear their relationship caused. Though the story hints at other homosexual relationships Jack has, neither character is explicitly depicted as homosexual. For Ennis, Jack was the love of his life in spite of the fact that he was raised to despise
homosexuality. He simply loved Jack. Jack’s death is, at the very least, a temporary release from the burden that being in a homosexual relationship causes Ennis; in spite of the pain the death brings him.
Masculinity
Freedom is one of the most essential elements of the western genre, it is
beliefs about masculinity, much like Ennis’ father was in showing him the corpse of a homosexual man. These beliefs resonate with the idea of masculinity presented by Sheriff Bell in No Country for Old Men when he tells his uncle the truth about his Bronze Star,
The old man sat for a long time. He was bent slightly forward looking at the floor. After a while he nodded. I think I know where this is goin, he said.
Yessir.
What do you think he would of done? I know what he would of done. Yeah. I guess I do too.
He’d of set there till hell froze over and then stayed a while on the ice. Do you think that makes him a better man than you?
Yessir. I do (McCarthy 278-279).
Ennis and Jack along with Bell are unable to lead full lives. They are limited by their insecurities and doubts of their masculinity. There is always fear of being discovered, fear of retribution, and fear of rejection and this fear traps them into a life that can never satisfy them. The fear of being ‘outed,’ either as a homosexual or as fraudulent war hero, creates a perpetual feeling of emasculation within these seemingly very masculine western figures.
circumstance reduces them to babysitting sheep on the side of a mountain. This slight to their manhood aside, Ennis and Jack are perhaps two of the most actualized depictions of the classic cowboy in contemporary literature, “The cowboy is the American emblem par excellence, and Ennis del Mar and Jack Twist are nothing if not prototypical cowboys. Exemplars of pastoral purity and yeoman industry, they possess the knowledge and skills of the wilderness. They are authentic American heroes, self-reliant and brave, honorable and loyal” (Kitses 24). Ennis and Jack represent in almost all things the character of the cowboy, their actions, speech, and demeanor are all classic elements of the cowboy. It is only through their love for one another that their masculinity and status as a cowboy comes into question. The language and style of the short story also lends itself to the characterization of Ennis and Jack as cowboys. The dialogue is sparse, forcing the reader to examine the characters themselves in order to attain a better understanding. In the short story format a cowboy is not forced to speak where he normally would not, creating a more inward looking narrative than might happen with a novel. The relationship they have with one another is perhaps most reflective of the stoic, burly nature of the American cowboy who was often soft-spoken and mild-mannered.
There is nothing about the relationship between Ennis and Jack that differs from the relationships between classic western cowboys, other than the obvious fact that this is a homosexual relationship. Neither man is exactly expressive in his feelings for the other; they let their actions speak rather than their words,
bitch; then, and as easily as the right key turns the lock tumblers, their mouths came together, and hard. Jack’s big teeth bringing blood, his hat falling to the floor, stubble rasping, wet saliva welling, and the door opening and Alma looking out for a few seconds at Ennis’s straining shoulders and shutting the door again and still they clinched, pressing chest and groin and thigh and leg together, treading on each other’s toes until they pulled apart to breathe and Ennis, not big on endearments, said what he said to his horses and daughters, little darlin (Proulx 265-266).
Though few words are exchanged in this meeting, the first since the summer spent on Brokeback Mountain four years earlier, the scene is wrought with emotion, but the feelings they have for one another are physically translated rather than explicitly stated. While their relationship is not without faults, nothing can be detracted from the simple honesty of their affection for one another.
he wants and is not afraid to go after it making him a more complete modernization of the fearless cowboy, “Jack is a true cowboy (even if he is merely a rodeo cowboy in real life—and a bad one at that). He has the courage to live without shame, even if it
eventually costs him his life” (Meyer 15). This separation between Ennis and Jack is key in distinguishing the cowboy from the regular man. Ennis, unable to overcome his fears, can never become the man he needs to be and can never ascend to the iconic status of the true American cowboy. Brokeback Mountain leaves readers with feelings of emptiness and disappointment, which can only be filled with the strong, determined masculinity of the cowboy who would not have let his life be dictated by the expectations of others.
self-deprecation and the tone is often one of guilt. This use of language is congruent with Bell’s character as a moral individual with roots in the idyllic western sheriff. Bell’s guilt stems from his actions during World War II, for which he feels he wrongly received a Bronze Star. This guilt and the way in which Bell initially avoids discussing it make Bell the most relatable character, also evidenced by Bell being the only first-person narrator, “I wont talk about the war neither. I was supposed to be a war hero and I lost a whole squad of men. Got decorated for it. They died and I got a medal. I dont even need to know that you think about that. There aint a day I dont remember it” (McCarthy 195). The reminiscences serve as more than an interruption of the novel’s action, becoming an in-depth analysis of Bell’s character and his motivations,
Bell’s monologues, internal, and/or addressed to some assumed audience (ourselves), are realist in character. Their colloquial language and patterns of speech reveal that McCarthy has lost none of his gift for the creation of a
convincing “speaking” voice. These sequences, unique in his oeuvre, are mimetic in character, intended to take us into the mind and emotions of a fully realised human personality. This mimetic and humanistic thread of the narrative is generically rooted in the “western” aspect of the novel’s antecedents (Cant 244). These monologues provide deep insight into the workings of Bell’s character, but do nothing to solidify his masculinity. Instead these monologues serve as a genuine look into a man whose entire life has been dictated by feelings of inadequacy regarding his
character, particularly his masculinity in direct comparison with his father and the other emblems of traditional masculinity he grew up with.
character that do not quite live up to the cowboy’s heroic status. Bell is no Lassiter from Grey’s Riders of the Purple Sage, able to ride into town and save the damsel in distress while simultaneously coming to terms with his own shortcomings nor is he brave enough to be like the Virginian in Wister’s The Virginian. Though Bell has many of the strong moral characteristics of a cowboy he is often too unsure or hesitant in his actions to evoke the bravado associated with these iconic cowboys.
Bell also exhibits similarities to the hard-boiled detective but is not a true
reincarnation of that type of character either. The methods Bell employs in his search for Moss and Chigurh are conventional and stick to the letter of the law much more than the deceptive or infiltrative methods employed by the Continental Op or Philip Marlowe in the hard-boiled detective. Bell is not the cold-hearted, emotionally void person that the detective figure is often made out to be; he cares about the people he encounters, even those who do not deserve his sympathy, like the prisoner he goes to visit,
I looked at this man. Mexican, maybe thirty-five, forty years old. Spoke good English. I said to him that I didnt come up there to be insulted but I just wanted him to know that didnt think he done it and he just rared back and laughed and he said: Where do they find somebody like you? Have they got you in diapers yet? I shot that son of a bitch right between the eyes and drug him back to his car by the hair of his head and set the car on fire and burned him to grease.
Well. These people can read you pretty good. If I had of smacked him in the mouth that guard would not of said word one. And he knew that. He knew that (McCarthy 297).
Despite his reservations about the world he lives in, Bell does his best to emulate the earnest, hardworking nature of the old time sheriffs. He is proud of his profession and makes no apologies for his actions as sheriff. Taking no pains to hide his age or
experience, Bell recalls times gone by with fondness and respect, often leading to the conclusion that he preferred the simpler times,
I never had to kill nobody and I am very glad of that fact. Some of the old time sheriffs wouldnt even carry a firearm. A lot of folks find that hard to believe but it’s a fact. Jim Scarborough never carried one. That’s the younger Jim. Gaston Boykins wouldnt wear one. Up in Comanche County. I always liked to hear about the old timers. Never missed a chance to do so. The old time concern that the sheriffs had for their people is been watered down some. You cant help but feel it. Nigger Hoskins over in Bastrop County knowed everbody’s phone number in the whole county by heart. […] It takes very little to govern good people. Very little. And bad people cant be governed at all. Or if they could I never heard of it (McCarthy 63-64).
Bell’s nostalgia, while not unexpected, serves to emasculate him in the role of the western sheriff. His fondness for the past seems to be a detriment to his ability to act as sheriff in the present, it appears to have made him soft, yearning for the simple times rather than focusing on enforcing justice in the corrupt world he lives in.
The characters in Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men raise the question of what the idea of masculinity, specifically American masculinity,
encompasses, what it allows and what subverts this ideal. Both texts manage to weaken the classic embodiments of American masculinity: the cowboy and the detective, through protagonists whose defining characteristics are generally regarded as un-masculine. The immorality Ennis subconsciously feels over his homosexual behavior and the guilt Sheriff Bell feels over his cowardice in the war both reflect two very un-masculine traits. Though these two men are without question the most earnest, hard-working characters within their respective texts they are certainly not the best representations of American masculinity, as defined by the classically masculine characters found in the western and hard-boiled detective genres. No Country for Old Men’s most definitively masculine character is Anton Chigurh, creating a starkly negative view of old fashioned masculinity. Chigurh is a hyper-masculine character, embodying the moral steadfastness of the
cowboy, the resourcefulness of the hard-boiled detective, and never doubting his own actions. By making Chigurh, the antagonist, the novel’s most masculine character McCarthy emphasizes the disparity between what was previously considered masculine and good and what masculinity means in contemporary society. The masculinity
emphasized in the western and hard-boiled detective genres is exact, the qualities of the cowboy and detective: bravado, steadfast morality, and heterosexuality among others leave no room for interpretation. Through this definition of American masculinity, Ennis, Jack, and Sheriff Bell are not masculine.
Though it may be difficult to consider Chigurh, a sociopath, as the most
it is not difficult to recognize the masculinity in a character like Jack’s father in Brokeback Mountain. Jack’s father does not say or do anything particularly mean to Ennis, but is, nevertheless, a fairly unlikable man. Jack’s father embodies the old western masculinity: he has the freedom to do what he wants, he is hardworking and
self-sufficient. But this traditional masculinity represented by Jack’s father is no longer a suitable definition for masculinity. The fate of this old masculinity is tied to that of Jack’s father’s ranch. Both are failing, unable to exist in a changing America.
The Role of Women
No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain are, strictly speaking, stories about men. The main characters in both texts are all men and while there are female characters present they are more notable for their absence than anything else. These male-character-dominated stories are typical of both the western and hard-boiled detective genres. The difference between No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain and their classic predecessors lies is in the way that the texts treat the women found in their pages. Whereas the women of the western and hard-boiled detective were often
stereotypical representations of the femme fatale or damsel in distress, the women of McCarthy and Proulx’s novels cannot be defined as anything more than background characters. Their absence and lack of their own story-line or perspective creates
Mountain allow them the ability to separate themselves from the conventional female characters.
To understand the difference between the female characters of No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain and their literary predecessors it is important to distinguish the stereotypical female characters found in the western and hard-boiled detective genres. The typical female character found in the western genre is the damsel in distress. She is dependent on the cowboy to solve her problems and save the day. This type of rescue is often depicted in a physical manner where the female’s life is actually in danger, but it also includes a sort of salvation in the sense that before the dashing cowboy comes along her life is not quite complete. In Owen Wister’s The Virginian, the reader is introduced to Molly Stark Wood, a young schoolteacher from the East whose stagecoach, while traveling to Wyoming, starts to keel over into the river with her inside of it,
as she felt the seat careen, she put out her head and tremulously asked if anything was wrong. But the driver was addressing his team with much language, and also with the lash.
Then a tall rider appeared close against the buried axles, and took her out of the stage on his horse so suddenly that she screamed. She felt splashes, saw a swimming flood, and found herself lifted down upon the shore. The rider said something to her about cheering up, and its being all right, but her wits were stock-still, so she did not speak and thank him (Wister 85-86).
Molly, an arguably brave character, moves alone from the East to Wyoming, but still succumbs to the stereotype of the damsel in distress because she is in unfamiliar territory, physically and mentally. Molly does not know the ways of the West and unsure how to handle herself in these dangerous types of situations.
affairs, she is simply unable to do so. Through the course of the novel Jane becomes uncertain of what path to take and is almost in a state of disbelief of what has happened to her life. It is her uncertainty that truly makes Jane a damsel in distress, hesitant about everything and unable to make any decisions. It falls to Lassiter, the mysterious cowboy to save Jane,
The door opened and she saw him, the old Lassiter, slow, easy, gentle, cool, yet not exactly the same Lassiter. She rose, and for a moment her eyes blurred and swam in tears.
“Are you—all—all right?” she asked, tremulously. “I reckon.”
“Lassiter, I’ll ride away with you. Hide me till danger is past—till we are forgotten—then take me where you will. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God!” (Grey 238)
The damsel in distress serves to highlight the intense masculinity of the cowboy. Through their interactions, the cowboy becomes a hero, solidifying his status as the iconic
American man. Without a helpless female to save, the cowboy would be reduced to nothing more than a hard-worker, his courage and selflessness would most likely remain unrealized.
Quite contrary to the damsel in distress is the femme fatale found in the hard-boiled detective genre. Whereas the damsel in distress is often an innocent who finds herself unable to solve her own problems or save herself, the femme fatale is dangerous, conniving, and uses her sexuality to get what she wants,
“I’m going to ask you to do something for me. You like me enough don’t you?”
“I want you to not do anything more about what I told you last night. Now wait a minute. Wait till I get through. Dan was right. I oughtn’t sell Max out like that. It would be utterly filthy. Besides, it’s Noonan you chiefly want, isn’t it? Well, if you’ll be a nice darling and lay off Max this time, I’ll give you enough on Noonan to nail him forever. You’d like that better, wouldn’t you? And you like me too much to want to take advantage of me by using information I gave you when I was mad at what Max had said, don’t you?” (Hammett 103)
The femme fatale is exactly what her name suggests: dangerous if not fatal. Though other female characters may appear in the hard-boiled detective genre, it is the femme fatale that is most prevalent.
Dinah Brand from Dashiell Hammett’s Red Harvest is a prime example of the femme fatale. Dinah uses her sexuality as a means of coercion and control both with the Continental Op and other characters in the novel including Donald Willsson and Max ‘Whisper’ Thaler, both of whom end up dead. The fact that the only way in which Dinah feels she can exact her will is through seduction or threat of violence speaks to the one-dimensionality of the femme fatale; she is concerned only with protecting herself and her interests. It is only through the function of the femme fatale that Dinah serves the plot and the protagonist.
emphasize the cowboy’s bravery; the femme fatale shows the detective’s manipulative and sleuthing abilities. Her sexuality also highlights the masculinity of the detective through the presence of an often intimate, heterosexual relationship.
Where the female stereotypes of the western and hard-boiled detective genres differ most from the women found in No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain is in their function in the plot. While none of the women play the protagonist of their respective texts, the women of the western and hard-boiled detective genres tended to play a more vocal part than the women in No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain. The women, while important to the text’s male characters, are often
overlooked; their significance is noted through their absence. In No Country for Old Men, the reader is quickly introduced to Llewelyn Moss’ young wife, Carla Jean. Carla Jean expresses worry over her husband’s strange behavior, but is powerless to stop him from making some ultimately very poor decisions that end both of their lives prematurely. Beyond anything else Carla Jean is a victim. Though Moss does his best to take care of her, he cannot save her. McCarthy includes the perspectives of Moss, Sheriff Bell, and Anton Chigurh throughout the novel, but there is never any insight into Carla Jean’s thoughts. In fact, the most dialogue given to Carla Jean comes at the moment Chigurh finds and kills her. But even the scene of her impending death sheds more light on Chigurh’s character than her own,
She looked at him a final time. You dont have to, she said. You dont. You dont.
prevail over that which you refuse to acknowledge the existence of. Do you understand? When I came into your life your life was over. It had a beginning, a middle, and an end. This is the end. You can say that things could have turned out differently. That they could have been some other way. But what does that mean? They are not some other way. They are this way. You’re asking that I second say the world. Do you see?
Yes, she said, sobbing. I do. I truly do.
Good, he said. That’s good. Then he shot her (McCarthy 259-260). This scene only reiterates Carla Jean’s role as a victim, a casualty of the novel and the actions of its male characters. Carla Jean is only significant in her death, which is used solely to accentuate Chigurh’s moral code and to emphasize Moss and Sheriff Bell’s inability to quell the blood flow of Chigurh’s sociopathic hunt. This inability to save Carla Jean is a huge emasculation of the novel’s two protagonists.
Toward the end of the novel and his life, Moss picks up a hitchhiker. The hitchhiker, a girl about fifteen or sixteen years old, is a damsel in distress, typical of the western. Moss tries to save her, picking her up, feeding her, giving her money, but in the end she is killed by some of Moss’ hunters. Her death is further reiteration of the male protagonists of No Country for Old Men’s inability to save a woman: the ultimate separation between them and the heroic cowboy. Through both Moss and Sheriff Bell’s inability to save Carla Jean or the hitchhiker their failures as cowboys are realized. Among all their shortcomings and flaws, this is what truly detracts from their supposed status as cowboys and as men.
his wife is also more equal than typically found in the western and hard-boiled detective genres,
When I told her I was quittin she at first didnt take me to mean it literally but I told her I did so mean it. I told her I hoped the people of this county would have better sense than to even vote for me. I told her I didnt feel right takin their money. She said well you dont mean that and I told her I meant it ever word. We’re six thousand dollars in debt over this job too and I dont know what I’m goin to do about that either. Well we just set there for a time. I didnt think it would upset her like it done. Finally I just said: Loretta, I cant do it no more. And she smiled and she said: You aim to quit while you’re ahead? And I said no mam I just aim to quit. I aint ahead by a damn sight. I never will be (McCarthy 296). The fairly modern relationship between Bell and his wife slights Bell’s status as a cowboy, his wife is not someone that he must save, instead she is a friend, an equal.
In Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain we are given even fewer scenes and less dialogue from the story’s two most noteworthy female characters: Alma Beers and Lureen Newsome, Ennis del Mar and Jack Twist’s wives, respectively. There is little to no information given about these two women and their only functions within the novel are as wives and mothers. Alma and Lureen represent a social obligation that Ennis and Jack feel they must comply with. It is never stated whether Ennis or Jack love their wives or not, but the novel makes it clear that Ennis and Jack’s love for one another is
“You know,” she said, and from her tone he knew something was coming, “I used to wonder how come you never brought any trouts home. Always said you caught plenty. So one time I got your creel case open the night before you went on one a your little trips—price tag still on it after five years—and I tied a note on the end of the line. It said, ‘Hello, Ennis, bring some fish home, love, Alma.’ And then you come back and said you’d caught a bunch a browns and ate them up. Remember? I looked in the case when I got a chance and there was my note still tied there and that line hadn’t touched water in its life.” As though the word “water” had called out its domestic cousin, she twisted the faucet, sluiced the plates.
“That don’t mean nothin.”
“Don’t lie, don’t you try to fool me, Ennis. I know what it means. Jack Twist? Jack Nasty. You and him—” (Proulx 272-273).
Alma’s accusation shows only suspicion of a sexual relationship between Ennis and Jack, nothing suggests that she believes the two are in love or that their relationship is more than sexual. Neither Alma nor Lureen are restricted by a stereotype or generalization, instead the reader is left to ponder the existence of these two women. Though their function as wives and mothers is significant to the development of the plot, as it
represents a restriction the novel’s protagonists cannot overcome, there is no information given about Alma or Lureen outside of their relationship with Ennis and Jack. Even when Alma divorces Ennis and remarries the Riverton grocer, it is seen solely through Ennis’ eyes. It is a surface-level observation, and the opportunity to understand Alma’s character a little better goes by unused. Lureen is hardly mentioned at all, and there is no dialogue from her until Ennis, following the news that Jack is dead, tries to call Jack and instead has a brief conversation with Lureen. The characters of Alma and Lureen serve as an emasculation of Ennis and Jack, they are constant reminders of what it means to be masculine and that Ennis and Jack never will be.
Chapter 3: Subverting the Genre
The western and hard-boiled detective both often end with lessons and some sort of resolution that leaves the characters and the readers alike with a feeling of satisfaction. These resolutions are a key distinction between the western and the hard-boiled detective genres and their contemporary counterparts. Whereas “Traditional Westerns always end with justice preserved.” (Meyer 10) Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men end neither with justice nor a happy ending for their protagonists. The conclusions of classic westerns or hard-boiled detectives leave readers with a sense that as long as there are characters like Lassiter and the Virginian or Philip Marlowe and the Continental Op there is hope that the injustices of America can be remedied. The stark outcomes of Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men suggest otherwise.
The central conflict to the traditional resolution of the western or hard-boiled narratives in No Country for Old Men is Anton Chigurh. Chigurh is, in every respect, the novel’s villain, he hunts Llewelyn Moss and evades capture by Sheriff Bell, he is
supposed to be caught, justice is supposed to be served, but instead Chigurh escapes and goes on living his life while Moss dies and Bell retires. In the end the bad guy wins and the cowboys fail. Chigurh is a different type of villain, he is principled and his morals are more steadfast than those of any character in either No Country for Old Men or
Brokeback Mountain. Like a true cowboy, Chigurh does not waver. He places little to no value on human life, instead viewing it as a commodity or something to be gambled with,
The man looked at Chigurh’s eyes for the first time. Blue as lapis. At once glistening and totally opaque. Like wet stones. You need to call it, Chigurh said. I cant call it for you. It wouldnt be fair. It wouldnt even be right. Just call it.
Yes you did. You’ve been putting it up your whole life. You just didn’t know it. You know what the date is on this coin?
No.
It’s nineteen fifty-eight. It’s been traveling twenty-two years to get here. And now it’s here. And I’m here. And I’ve got my hand over it. And it’s either heads or tails. And you have to say. Call it.
I dont know what it is I stand to win.
In the blue light the man’s face was beaded thinly with sweat. He licked his upper lip.
You stand to win everything, Chigurh said. Everything (McCarthy 56). By reducing life to the outcome of a coin toss Chigurh shows that the only value he places on life is that it is something to be lost. This ideology is reinforced time and time again in the novel with the increasing number of bodies Chigurh leaves in his wake. Chigurh kills because he can and feels that it is his moral obligation to treat life as something to be taken away at will. Death and killing are the moral codes to Chigurh’s life, when he threatens to kill someone he must carry out his threat because he knows he is only as good as his word, “Chigurh stands up to God with an unflinching,
She sat slumped forward, holding her hat in her arms. You’ve got no cause to hurt me, she said.
I know. But I gave my word. Your word?
Yes. We’re at the mercy of the dead here. In this case your husband (McCarthy 255).
Chigurh goes on further to explain that although Moss is dead, his threat to kill Carla Jean must be fulfilled. Chigurh views his word as an unbreakable covenant. This moral code is Chigurh’s justification for everything he does. Chigurh may be a villain but there is no question as to the integrity by which he holds himself to his own moral code.
Chigurh most closely resembles a sociopathic hit man or even a serial killer. Though his motives are clear, he wants to find the briefcase and reap the rewards of returning it to its owner; his hunt for the briefcase often takes a far deadlier turn than is ultimately necessary. McCarthy uses Chigurh as something of an ‘Angel of Death’ who is, in Chigurh’s mind, purging the world of its entitlement to live. The use of Chigurh in such a way creates a plot that has Ed Tom Bell following Chigurh by means of a trail of dead bodies, “Dead bodies in the street. Citizens’ businesses all shot up. People’s cars. Whoever heard of such a thing?” (McCarthy 134) This blatant use of death and violence is more reminiscent of the hard-boiled detective genre than the western. Although there is certainly violence in the western it is not explicit in its description nor is it the thoughtless killing so often found in the hard-boiled detective genre. Red Harvest is so named
with. I’m going to use it opening Poisonville up from Adam’s apple to ankles” (Hammett 64). This imagery of a body sliced open from end to end encapsulates the bloodiness that will follow in the novel. The graphic nature of the violence found in the hard-boiled detective genre is likewise found in the killings of Anton Chigurh,
He closed his eyes and he turned his head and he raised one hand to fend away what could not be fended away. Chigurh shot him in the face. Everything that Wells had ever known or thought or loved drained slowly down the wall behind him. His mother’s face, his First Communion, women he had known. The faces of men as they died on their knees before him. The body of a child dead in a roadside ravine in another country. He lay half headless on the bed with his arms outflung, most of his right hand missing. Chigurh rose and picked up the empty casing off the rug and blew into it and put it in his pocket and looked at his watch. The new day was still a minute away (McCarthy 178).
Chigurh’s brutality and irreverence take the bloodshed and violence found within the hard-boiled detective genre and further it into a role that denies any shred of humanity or compassion. Chigurh’s actions, including those immediately following the brutal murder, leave no doubt in the reader’s mind of his single-mindedly ruthless and cold-blooded nature. This insight into Chigurh’s character creates a stark contrast between himself and the antagonists of both the western and the hard-boiled detective who commit their crimes with motives like Elder Tull’s jealousy or Chief Noonan’s revenge in contrast to the needlessness of Chigurh’s actions.
A noteworthy detail about the violence found in No Country for Old Men is the unconventional weapon Chigurh uses on his victims. Though Chigurh uses guns throughout the novel, his weapon of choice is a captive bolt pistol, which is used in the humane slaughter of cattle:
They had a knocker straddled the chute and they’d let the beeves through one at a time and he’d knock em in the head with a maul. He done that all day.
That sounds about right. They dont do it thataway no more. They use a airpowered gun that shoots a steel bold out of it. Just shoots it out about so far. They put that thing between the beef’s eyes and pull the trigger and down she goes. It’s that quick.
Torbert was standing at the corner of Bell’s desk. He waited a minute for the sheriff to continue but the sheriff didnt continue. Torbert stood there. Then he looked away. I wish you hadnt of even told me, he said.
I know, said Bell. I knowed what you’d say fore you said it (McCarthy 106).
The fact that Chigurh uses this device as a weapon further emphasizes what little regard he has for human life. The use of a captive bolt pistol rather than a gun stresses a distinct point in Chigurh’s attitude toward death; rather than using a gun which allows for some distance between oneself and the target, Chigurh uses a weapon that forces him to stand directly before his victim, essentially looking him or her in the eyes as he kills in cold blood. This stark imagery sheds more light on the character of Chigurh than any other aspect of the novel. It is what truly separates him from the villains of the western or the hard-boiled detective genres. Chigurh is brazen in his ability to take a life, he does not hide behind the actions of others or allow feelings to sway him; he takes the ultimate payment: a human life.
McCarthy allows his protagonists to fail and his antagonist to succeed. No
strong and brave and good you could not only persevere but you could thrive. No Country for Old Men thwarts this idea.
Conclusion
The iconic status of the cowboy and the detective leave little to be desired within their respective genres; both characters are strong, independent, masculine men with a strong sense of right and wrong. In the framework of contemporary American literature, the cowboy and the detective, as they were once depicted, are no longer viable options for realistic depictions of American masculinity. While America still has roots in the western and hard-boiled detective genres, these classic characters are now too well defined and limited to be used realistically. However, there remains a desire to capture the essence of the true American man in a way that alludes to his traditional background but manages to be a real, fleshed-out character rather than a stereotype. These characters must also reflect the change in America’s ideals and culture. Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men comment on these cultural changes and specifically how they impact gender roles.
The cultural resonance of Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men is nowhere more evident than in the critical and commercial success of each text’s film adaptation. Each film pays homage to their roots in the western and film noir and it is with the adept blending of these two cinematic styles that the perpetuating and
simultaneously subversive nature of the texts are fully realized,
One way to view the ending of No Country is as a mixing of the two great American movie genres, the western and film noir. These two great American film genres reflect the two sides of the American psyche. On the one hand, there is the western in which the westerner is faced with overwhelming odds, but between his perseverance and his skill, he overcomes the odds and triumphs. This allegorizes the optimism of the American psyche. In film noir, on the other hand, the hero is smart (more or less) and wily and there are many obstacles to
overwhelmed by the juggernaut of other people’s evil or by the way the world just happens to go. This genre reflects the pessimism and fatalism of the American psyche. With No Country for Old Men, the Coens combine these two genres into one movie. It is a western with a tragic, existential, film noir ending. The western speaks to our youth (and nostalgically to us in our old age); film noir speaks to the sadder wisdom of age. No Country for Old Men speaks of both (Gilmore 76). The film adaptation of No Country for Old Men does an excellent job of highlighting the hybrid nature of the novel, realizing that the story cannot be wholly western or hard-boiled in a contemporary setting. Richard Gilmore’s description of how each genre influencing the film alludes to a part of the American psyche emphasizes that neither genre can fully exist while the other is also present. This conclusion can also be attached to the gender portrayals in both texts and their respective film adaptations. The
protagonists made famous by the western and hard-boiled detective genres cannot exist in a contemporary setting because they contradict the realization that society is no longer black and white, easily defined or understood; as the American culture has grown so too must its vision of the American hero.
relies on self-knowledge to gain the only real conclusion to be gleaned from the novel and its film adaptation,
Bell is forced to contemplate the approach of the one certain thing in human life. His retrospective on his own life forces him to admit, like all McCarthy’s
‘heroes’, that there are no heroes and that the culture that taught him to believe in them, and that he could become one of them, was false. Above all he has to contemplate what the American West has come to and to see the fate, allegorized in the persons of Moss and Chigurh (Cant 250).
The stark reality of both Brokeback Mountain and No Country for Old Men is that the America they were raised to believe in no longer exists because of how they, as men, have changed.
their struggles are real. It is not a struggle with what to do with the circumstances given to them but rather how they react to these situations, how they feel and how those feelings impact their actions. With characters like Ennis or Bell, they do not hide behind a wall of bravado or cunning but are vulnerable. Where it was once the women of the western and hard-boiled detective who must be vulnerable to emphasize the male
character’s masculinity, now it is the male protagonists who are vulnerable: susceptible to the pains of the world and unable to save themselves. Unlike the western and hard-boiled detective there is no simple solution to their problems; complications exist everywhere.
The deliberate use of characters who no longer fit the mold of masculinity makes possible that in which the western and hard-boiled detective failed: the creation of an American genre that does not simply fall back on archetypal characters. No Country for Old Men and Brokeback Mountain realize the ‘American dream,’ the struggle, the optimism, and the failure that have come to be regarded as indicative of the American culture. Their use of literary influence from the western and hard-boiled detective genres is effective and necessary both in its respect and its subversion. It is only through
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