No Country for Old Men Quotes

Llewelyn Moss: If I don't come back, tell mother I love her.

Carla Jean Moss: Your mother's dead, Llewelyn.

Llewelyn Moss: Well then I'll tell her myself.

Anton Chigurh: What's the most you ever lost on a coin toss?

Gas Station Proprietor: Sir?

Anton Chigurh: The most. You ever lost. On a coin toss.

Gas Station Proprietor: I don't know. I couldn't say.

[Chigurh flips a quarter from the change on the counter and covers it with his hand]

Anton Chigurh: Call it.

Gas Station Proprietor: Call it?

Anton Chigurh: Yes.

Gas Station Proprietor: For what?

Anton Chigurh: Just call it.

Gas Station Proprietor: Well, we need to know what we're calling it for here.

Anton Chigurh: You need to call it. I can't call it for you. It wouldn't be fair.

Gas Station Proprietor: I didn't put nothin' up.

Anton Chigurh: Yes, you did. You've been putting it up your whole life, you just didn't know it. You know what date is on this coin?

Gas Station Proprietor: No.

Anton Chigurh: 1958. It's been traveling twenty-two years to get here. And now it's here. And it's either heads or tails. And you have to say. Call it.

Gas Station Proprietor: Look, I need to know what I stand to win.

Anton Chigurh: Everything.

Gas Station Proprietor: How's that?

Anton Chigurh: You stand to win everything. Call it.

Gas Station Proprietor: Alright. Heads then.

[Chigurh removes his hand, revealing the coin is indeed heads]

Anton Chigurh: Well done.

[the gas station proprietor nervously takes the quarter with the small pile of change he's apparently won while Chigurh starts out]

Anton Chigurh: Don't put it in your pocket, sir. Don't put it in your pocket. It's your lucky quarter.

Gas Station Proprietor: Where do you want me to put it?

Anton Chigurh: Anywhere not in your pocket. Where it'll get mixed in with the others and become just a coin. Which it is.

[Chigurh leaves and the gas station proprietor stares at him as he walks out]

Carla Jean Moss: You don't have to do this.

Anton Chigurh: [smiles] People always say the same thing.

Carla Jean Moss: What do they say?

Anton Chigurh: They say, "You don't have to do this."

Carla Jean Moss: You don't.

Anton Chigurh: Okay.

[Chigurh flips a coin and covers it with his hand]

Anton Chigurh: This is the best I can do. Call it.

Carla Jean Moss: I knowed you was crazy when I saw you sitting there. I knowed exactly what was in store for me.

Anton Chigurh: Call it.

Carla Jean Moss: No. I ain't gonna call it.

Anton Chigurh: Call it.

Carla Jean Moss: The coin don't have no say. It's just you.

Anton Chigurh: Well, I got here the same way the coin did.

[first lines]

Ed Tom Bell: I was sheriff of this county when I was twenty-five years old. Hard to believe. My grandfather was a lawman; father too. Me and him was sheriffs at the same time; him up in Plano and me out here. I think he's pretty proud of that. I know I was. Some of the old time sheriffs never even wore a gun. A lotta folks find that hard to believe. Jim Scarborough'd never carried one; that's the younger Jim. Gaston Boykins wouldn't wear one up in Comanche County. I always liked to hear about the oldtimers. Never missed a chance to do so. You can't help but compare yourself against the oldtimers. Can't help but wonder how they would have operated these times. There was this boy I sent to the 'lectric chair at Huntsville Hill here a while back. My arrest and my testimony. He killt a fourteen-year-old girl. Papers said it was a crime of passion but he told me there wasn't any passion to it. Told me that he'd been planning to kill somebody for about as long as he could remember. Said that if they turned him out he'd do it again. Said he knew he was going to hell. "Be there in about fifteen minutes". I don't know what to make of that. I sure don't. The crime you see now, it's hard to even take its measure. It's not that I'm afraid of it. I always knew you had to be willing to die to even do this job. But, I don't want to push my chips forward and go out and meet something I don't understand. A man would have to put his soul at hazard. He'd have to say, "O.K., I'll be part of this world."

Nervous Accountant: Are you going to shoot me?

Anton Chigurh: That depends. Do you see me?

[Anton has just shot the Man who hires Wells in the throat, and is standing over his body]

[to Nervous Accountant]

Anton Chigurh: Who are you?

Nervous Accountant: Me?

Anton Chigurh: Yes.

Nervous Accountant: Nobody... accounting.

Anton Chigurh: He gave the Mexicans a receiver.

[Anton sighs]

Nervous Accountant: He feels... he felt that the more people looking... .

[cut-off by Anton]

Anton Chigurh: That's foolish. You pick the one right tool.

Nervous Accountant: I see. Are you going to shoot me?

Anton Chigurh: That depends. Do you see me?

Carson Wells: [sitting by bed] Buenos Dias. I'm guessing this isn't the future you had planned for yourself when you first clapped eyes on that money. Don't worry, I'm not the man who's after you.

Llewelyn Moss: [in bed] I know that. I've seen him.

Carson Wells: You've seen him, and you're not dead?

Llewelyn Moss: What's this guy supposed to be, the ultimate badass?

Carson Wells: No, I wouldn't describe him as that.

Llewelyn Moss: How would you describe him?

Carson Wells: I guess I would say he doesn't have a sense of humor. His name is Chigurh.

Llewelyn Moss: Sugar?

Carson Wells: Chigurh, Anton Chigurh. Do you know how he found you?

Llewelyn Moss: Yeah, I know how he found me.

Carson Wells: Called a transponder.

Llewelyn Moss: Yeah, I know what it's called. He won't find me again.

Carson Wells: Not that way.

Llewelyn Moss: Not any way.

Carson Wells: Took me about three hours.

Llewelyn Moss: Yeah, well, I been immobile.

Carson Wells: No, you don't understand.

[last lines]

Loretta Bell: How'd you sleep?

Ed Tom Bell: I don't know. Had dreams.

Loretta Bell: Well you got time for 'em now. Anythin' interesting?

Ed Tom Bell: They always is to the party concerned.

Loretta Bell: Ed Tom, I'll be polite.

Ed Tom Bell: Alright then. Two of 'em. Both had my father in 'em. It's peculiar. I'm older now then he ever was by twenty years. So in a sense he's the younger man. Anyway, first one I don't remember too well but it was about meeting him in town somewhere, he's gonna give me some money. I think I lost it. The second one, it was like we was both back in older times and I was on horseback goin' through the mountains of a night. Goin' through this pass in the mountains. It was cold and there was snow on the ground and he rode past me and kept on goin'. Never said nothin' goin' by. He just rode on past... and he had his blanket wrapped around him and his head down and when he rode past I seen he was carryin' fire in a horn the way people used to do and I could see the horn from the light inside of it. 'Bout the color of the moon. And in the dream I knew that he was goin' on ahead and he was fixin' to make a fire somewhere out there in all that dark and all that cold, and I knew that whenever I got there he would be there. And then I woke up...

Wendell: We goin' in?

Ed Tom Bell: Gun out and up.

Wendell: [Wendell draws his pistol] What about yours?

Ed Tom Bell: I'm hidin' behind you.

Wendell: That's very linear, Sheriff.

Ed Tom Bell: Well, age will flatten a man.

Ed Tom Bell: You ride Winston.

Wendell: You sure?

Ed Tom Bell: Oh, I'm sure. Anything happens to Loretta's horse, I can tell ya I don't want to be the party that was on board.

Ed Tom Bell: Now that's aggravatin'.

Wendell: Sheriff?

Ed Tom Bell: [points to a bottle of milk] Still sweatin'.

Wendell: Whoa, Sheriff! We just missed him! We gotta circulate this! On Radio!

Ed Tom Bell: Alright. What we circulate? Lookin' for a man who has recently drunk milk?

Wendell: You know, there might not have been no money.

Ed Tom Bell: That's possible.

Wendell: But you don't believe it.

Ed Tom Bell: No. Probably I don't.

Wendell: It's a mess, ain't it, sheriff?

Ed Tom Bell: If it ain't, it'll do till the mess gets here.

Wendell: You think this boy Moss has got any notion of the sorts of sons of bitches that're huntin' him?

Ed Tom Bell: I don't know, he ought to. He's seen the same things I've seen, and it's certainly made an impression on me.

Man who hires Wells: [about Chigurh] Just how dangerous is he?

Carson Wells: Compared to what? The bubonic plague?

Anton Chigurh: [indicating bag of cashews] How much?

Gas Station Proprietor: Sixty-nine cent.

Anton Chigurh: This. And the gas.

Gas Station Proprietor: Y'all gettin' any rain up your way?

Anton Chigurh: What way would that be?

Gas Station Proprietor: I seen you was from Dallas.

Anton Chigurh: What business is it of yours where I'm from, friendo?

Gas Station Proprietor: I didn't mean nothin' by it.

Anton Chigurh: Didn't mean nothin'.

Gas Station Proprietor: I was just passin' the time. If you don't wanna accept that I don't know what else to do for you. Will there be something else?

Anton Chigurh: I don't know. Will there?

Gas Station Proprietor: Is somethin' wrong?

Anton Chigurh: With what?

Gas Station Proprietor: With anything?

Anton Chigurh: Is that what you're asking me? Is there something wrong with anything?

Gas Station Proprietor: Will there be anything else?

Anton Chigurh: You already asked me that.

Gas Station Proprietor: Well... I need to see about closin'.

Anton Chigurh: See about closing.

Gas Station Proprietor: Yessir.

Anton Chigurh: What time do you close?

Gas Station Proprietor: Now. We close now.

Anton Chigurh: Now is not a time. What time do you close?

Man who hires Wells: Did I say you could sit?

Carson Wells: No, but you strike me as a man who wouldn't want to waste his chair.

Llewelyn Moss: [talking over phone] Hello?

Anton Chigurh: Yes?

Llewelyn Moss: Is, uh, Carson Wells there?

Anton Chigurh: Not in the sense that you mean. You need to come see me.

Llewelyn Moss: Who is this?

Anton Chigurh: You know who it is. You need to talk to me.

Llewelyn Moss: I don't need to talk to you.

Anton Chigurh: I think you do. Do you know where I'm going?

Llewelyn Moss: Why would I care where you're going?

Anton Chigurh: I know where you are.

Llewelyn Moss: Yeah? Where am I?

Anton Chigurh: You're in the hospital across the river, but that's not where I'm going. Do you know where I'm going?

Llewelyn Moss: [blood flows on the floor, and so Chigurh lifts his feet and rests them on the bed] Yeah, I know where you're going.

Anton Chigurh: Alright.

Llewelyn Moss: You know she won't be there.

Anton Chigurh: It doesn't make any difference where she is.

Llewelyn Moss: So what are you going up there for?

Anton Chigurh: You know how this is going to turn out, don't you?

Llewelyn Moss: Nope.

Anton Chigurh: I think you do. So this is what I'll offer - you bring me the money and I'll let her go. Otherwise she's accountable, same as you. That's the best deal you're gonna get. I won't tell you you can save yourself, because you can't.

Llewelyn Moss: Yeah, I'm going to bring you something, alright. I decided to make you a special project of mine. You ain't going have to come looking for me at all.

[Moss hangs up the phone]

Carla Jean Moss: Llewelyn?

Llewelyn Moss: Yeah?

Carla Jean Moss: What are you doing, baby?

Llewelyn Moss: I'm going out.

Carla Jean Moss: Going where?

Llewelyn Moss: There's something I forgot to do, but I'll be back.

Carla Jean Moss: And what are you going to do?

Llewelyn Moss: I'm fixin' to do something dumber than hell, but I'm going anyways.

Anton Chigurh: I'm looking for Llewelyn Moss.

Desert Aire Manager: Did you go up to his trailer?

Anton Chigurh: Yes, I did.

Desert Aire Manager: Well, I'd say he's at work. Do you want to leave a message?

Anton Chigurh: Where does he work?

Desert Aire Manager: I can't say.

Anton Chigurh: Where does he work?

Desert Aire Manager: Sir, I ain't at liberty to give out no information about our residents.

Anton Chigurh: Where does he work?

Desert Aire Manager: Did you not hear me? We can't give out no information.

"Managerial" Victim #1: That's a dead dog.

Anton Chigurh: Yes it is.

Boy on Bike #2: Mister? You got a bone stickin' out of your arm.

Anton Chigurh: Let me just sit here a minute.

Carla Jean Moss: Where'd you get the pistol?

Llewelyn Moss: At the gettin' place.

Carla Jean Moss: Did you buy that gun?

Llewelyn Moss: No. I found it.

Carla Jean Moss: Llewelyn!

Llewelyn Moss: What? Quit hollerin'.

Carla Jean Moss: What'd you give for that thing?

Llewelyn Moss: You don't need to know everything, Carla Jean.

Carla Jean Moss: I need to know that.

Llewelyn Moss: You keep runnin' that mouth I'm gonna' take you in the back and screw ya'.

Carla Jean Moss: Big talk.

Llewelyn Moss: Keep it up.

Carla Jean Moss: Fine. I don't wanna' know. I don't even wanna' know where you been all day.

Llewelyn Moss: That'll work.

Loretta Bell: Be careful.

Ed Tom Bell: I always am.

Loretta Bell: Don't get hurt.

Ed Tom Bell: I never do.

Loretta Bell: Don't hurt no one.

Ed Tom Bell: [smiles] Well. If you say so.

Carson Wells: [Wells sits back and studies Moss] What do you do?

Llewelyn Moss: I'm retired.

Carson Wells: What did you do?

Llewelyn Moss: Welder.

Carson Wells: Acetylene? Mig? Tig?

Llewelyn Moss: Any of it. If it can be welded I can weld it.

Carson Wells: Cast iron?

Llewelyn Moss: Yeah.

Carson Wells: I don't mean braze.

Llewelyn Moss: I didn't say braze.

Carson Wells: Pot metal?

Llewelyn Moss: [annoyed] What did I say?

Carla Jean Moss: What's in the satchel?

Llewelyn Moss: It's full of money.

Carla Jean Moss: [sarcastically] Yeah, that'll be the day.

Carla Jean Moss: I got a bad feeling, Llewelyn.

Llewelyn Moss: Well I got a good feeling, so that should even out.

Wendell: [referring to the dead bodies in the desert] How come you reckon the coyotes ain't been at them?

Ed Tom Bell: I don't know. Supposedly, a coyote won't eat a Mexican.

Carla Jean Moss: Sheriff, was that a true story about Charlie Walser?

Ed Tom Bell: Who's Charlie Walser? Oh! Well... uh... a true story? I couldn't swear to every detail but it's certainly true that it is a story.

Ed Tom Bell: Carla Jean, thank you for coming.

Carla Jean Moss: Don't know why I did. I told you, I don't know where he is.

Ed Tom Bell: You hadn't heard from him?

Carla Jean Moss: No, I ain't.

Ed Tom Bell: Nuthin'?

Carla Jean Moss: Not word one.

Ed Tom Bell: Would you tell me if you had?

Carla Jean Moss: Well, I don't know. He don't need any trouble from you.

Ed Tom Bell: It ain't me he's in trouble with.

Carla Jean Moss: Who's he in trouble with then?

Ed Tom Bell: Some pretty bad people. These people will kill him, Carla Jean. They won't quit.

Carla Jean Moss: He won't neither. He never has. He can take all comers.

Ed Tom Bell: [Ed Tom sighs heavily] You know Charlie Walser's, got that place out east of Sanderson? Well, you know how they used to slaughter beeves, hit 'em right there with a maul, truss 'em up and slit their throats? Here, ol' Charlie's got one all trussed up, all set to drain him and the beef comes to, starts thrashing around. Six hundred pounds of very pissed-off livestock. If you'll excuse the... Well... Charlie grabs the gun there, shoot the damn thing in the head, but with all the swingin' and the thrashin', it's a glance-shot, ricochets around, comes back and hits Charlie in the shoulder. You go see Charlie, he still can't pick up his right hand for his hat... The point bein', that even in the contest between man and steer, the issue is not certain.

Carson Wells: Call me when you've had enough. I can even let you keep a little of the money.

Llewelyn Moss: If I was cuttin' deals, why wouldn't I go deal with this guy Chigurh?

Carson Wells: No no. No. You don't understand. You can't make a deal with him. Even if you gave him the money he'd still kill you. He's a peculiar man. You could even say that he has principles. Principles that transcend money or drugs or anything like that. He's not like you. He's not even like me.

Llewelyn Moss: He don't talk as much as you, I give him points for that.

Anton Chigurh: And you know what's going to happen now. You should admit your situation. There would be more dignity in it.

Carson Wells: You go to hell.

Anton Chigurh: [Chuckles] Alright. Let me ask you something. If the rule you followed brought you to this, of what use was the rule?

Carson Wells: Do you have any idea how crazy you are?

Anton Chigurh: You mean the nature of this conversation?

Carson Wells: I mean the nature of you.

Ed Tom Bell: How many of those things you got now?

Ellis: Cats? Several. Well, depends what you mean by got. Some are half-wild and some are just outlaws.

Ed Tom Bell: That man that shot you died in prison.

Ellis: Angola. Yeah...

Ed Tom Bell: What you'd done he had been released?

Ellis: Oh, I dunno. Nothing. Wouldn't be no point in it.

Ed Tom Bell: I'm kindly surprised to hear you say that.

Ellis: Well all the time ya spend trying to get back what's been took from ya, more is going out the door. After a while you just have to try to get a tourniquet on it. Your granddad never asked me to sign on as a deputy.

Carson Wells: I was wondering...

Man who hires Wells: Yes?

Carson Wells: Could you validate my parking ticket?

Man who hires Wells: An attempt at humor, I suppose.

Carson Wells: I'm sorry... You know, I counted the floors to this building from the street.

Man who hires Wells: [sighs] And?

Carson Wells: There's one missing.

Man who hires Wells: [sarcastically] We'll look into it.

Ed Tom Bell: The motel in Del Rio?

Wendell: Yes, sir. None of the three had I.D. on 'em, but they're tellin' me all three is Mexican... was Mexicans.

Ed Tom Bell: There's a question, whether they stopped being and when.

Wendell: Yes, sir.

El Paso Sheriff: Yea, well, none of that explains your man though.

Ed Tom Bell: Uh-huh.

El Paso Sheriff: He's just a goddamn homicidal lunatic, Ed Tom.

Ed Tom Bell: I'm not sure he's a lunatic.

El Paso Sheriff: Yeah ,well what would you call him?

Ed Tom Bell: Well, sometimes I think he's pretty much a ghost.

El Paso Sheriff: Oh, he's real all right.

Ed Tom Bell: Oh yeah.

El Paso Sheriff: Yeah, all that over at the Eagle Hotel? Huh, it's beyond everything.

Ed Tom Bell: Yeah. Got some hard bark on him.

El Paso Sheriff: Well... well, that don't hardly say it. He shoots the desk clerk one day, walks right back in the next and shoots a retired army colonel.

Boot Salesman: [Moss walks in wearing his hospital robe] How those Larry's holdin' up?

Llewelyn Moss: Uh, oh, good. Good! I need everything else.

Boot Salesman: OK.

Llewelyn Moss: Lotta people come in here without any clothes on?

Boot Salesman: No sir, it's unusual.

Carla Jean's Mother: And I always seen this is what it would come to. Three years ago I pre-visioned it.

Carla Jean Moss: It ain't even three years we been married.

Carla Jean's Mother: Three years ago I said them very words. No and Good.

Cabbie at Bus Station: Yes, ma'am.

Carla Jean's Mother: Now here we are. Ninety degree heat. I got the cancer. And look at this. Not even a home to go to.

Cabbie at Bus Station: Yes, ma'am.

Carla Jean's Mother: We're goin' to El Paso Texas. You know how many people I know in El Paso, Texas?

Cabbie at Bus Station: No, ma'am.

Carla Jean's Mother: [She holds up thumb and forefinger curled to make an O] That's how many. Ninety degree heat.

Carla Jean Moss: [the cab is stopped outside the depot. Carla Jean and her mother and the driver are at the trunk struggling over bags] I got it, Mama.

Carla Jean's Mother: I didn't see my Prednisone.

Carla Jean Moss: I put it in, Mama.

Carla Jean's Mother: Well, I didn't see it.

Carla Jean Moss: Well, I put it in. That one. You just set there. I'll get tickets and a cart for the bags.

Well Dressed Mexican: [as Carla Jean goes to the station a man emerges from a car pulled up behind. He is a well-dressed Mexican of early middle age] Do you need help with the bags, madam?

Carla Jean's Mother: Well, thank God there's one gentleman left in West Texas. Yes, thank you. I am old and I am not well.

Well Dressed Mexican: Which bus are you taking?

Carla Jean's Mother: We're going to El Paso don't ask me why. Discombobulated by a no-account son-in-law. Thank you. You don't often see a Mexican in a suit.

Well Dressed Mexican: You go to El Paso? I know it. Where are you staying?

Wendell: [Viewing the desert crime scene] It's a mess, ain't it, Sheriff?

Ed Tom Bell: If it ain't, it'll do till the mess gets here.

Carla Jean Moss: I ain't got the money. What little I had is long gone, and there's bills aplenty to pay yet. I buried my mother today. Ain't pay for that neither.

Anton Chigurh: I wouldn't worry about it.

Carla Jean Moss: I need to sit down.

Poolside Woman: Oh... that's who you keep looking out the window for?

Llewelyn Moss: Half...

Poolside Woman: What else then...?

Llewelyn Moss: Just looking for what's coming...

Poolside Woman: Yeah... But no one ever sees that coming...

Ed Tom Bell: Any word on those vehicles yet?

Sheriff Bell's Secretary: Sheriff, I found out everything there was to find. Those vehicles are titled and registered to deceased people. The owner of that Bronco's been dead 20 years. You want me to see if I can find out anything about the Mexican ones?

Ed Tom Bell: Oh, Lord no. Here's this month's checks.

Sheriff Bell's Secretary: That DEA agent called again. You gonna wanna talk to him?

Ed Tom Bell: Gonna try to keep from him as much as I can.

Sheriff Bell's Secretary: He's goin' back out there. Wanted to know if you wanted to go with him.

Ed Tom Bell: That's cordial of him. Can I get you to call Loretta for me, tell her I'm going to Odessa to see Carla Jean Moss?

Sheriff Bell's Secretary: Yeah, sure.

Ed Tom Bell: I'll call her when I get there. I'd call her now but she'll want me to come home and I just might.

Sheriff Bell's Secretary: You want me to wait 'til you quit the building?

Ed Tom Bell: Uh-huh. Don't wanna lie without what it's absolutely necessary. What is it Torbert says about truth and justice?

Sheriff Bell's Secretary: Oh... we dedicate ourselves daily anew. Somethin' like that.

Ed Tom Bell: I'm gonna commence dedicatin' myself twice daily. Might come to three times before it's over with.

Sporting Goods Clerk: Tent poles?

Llewelyn Moss: Mmm-hmm.

Sporting Goods Clerk: You already have a tent?

Llewelyn Moss: Well, somethin' like that.

Sporting Goods Clerk: Well, you give me the model number on the tent, I can order you the poles.

Llewelyn Moss: Nah, never mind. I want a tent.

Sporting Goods Clerk: Well, what kinda tent?

Llewelyn Moss: The kind with the most poles.

Ed Tom Bell: You wouldn't think a car'd burn like that.

Wendell: Yessir. We shoulda brought weenies.

Mexican in Bathtub: [after Anton Chigurh has killed his comrades; in Spanish] No me mate.

Anton Chigurh: How did you find that?

Mexican in Bathtub: No me mate.

[Chigurh closes the shower curtains and shoots him dead]

Ed Tom Bell: When Llewelyn calls, just tell him I can make him safe. 'Course, they slaughter steers a lot different these days. Use a air gun. Shoots out a little rod about that far under the brain. Sucks right back in. Animal never knows what hit him.

Carla Jean Moss: Why are you telling me that, Sheriff?

Ed Tom Bell: I don't know... my mind wanders.