Daily Dialogue — July 8, 2015

Anton Chigurh: You married into it?
Gas Station Proprietor: We lived in Temple Texas for many years. Raised a family there in Temple, we come out here about four years ago.
Anton Chigurh: You married into it?
Gas Station Proprietor: If that’s the way you want to put it.
Anton Chigurh: I don’t have some way to put it, that’s the way it is. 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 along with the rest of the change]
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.

— No Country for Old Men (2007), screenplay by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen, novel by Cormac McCarthy

The Daily Dialogue theme for the week: Subtext. Today’s suggestion by James Schramm.

Trivia: When Joel Coen and Ethan Coen approached Javier Bardem about playing Chigurh, he said “I don’t drive, I speak bad English, and I hate violence.” The Coens responded, “That’s why we called you.” Bardem said he took the role because his dream was to be in a Coen Brothers film.

Dialogue On Dialogue: Commentary by James: “From the masters of subtext. We are on the edge of our seats waiting to see if the clueless gas station owner is next on Chigurh’s list.”