On a desolate desert road, a white car was forced to a stop by the police.
Anton stepped out of the vehicle, carrying his specially designed weapon. Just moments ago, he had strangled a police officer to death with a handcuff chain at the station. Now, he was in the middle of an escape.
But the police car was too conspicuous, so he decided to switch to another vehicle.
Anton slowly walked up to the car window. Inside, an elderly man with white hair turned to ask, "Hello, what's going on?"
"I need you to step out of the car."
"What is that?"
"I need you to step out of the car," Anton repeated simply.
The old man obediently got out, first glancing at the tool in Anton's hands.
It was a large, silver-white high-pressure gas cylinder connected to a bolt gun with a red rubber hose—the kind of tool commonly seen in American slaughterhouses for killing livestock.
But the old man had never seen one before, so he looked confused. "What is that for…?"
"Please… please don't move." Anton raised a hand to stop him from speaking, then calmly pressed the bolt gun's barrel against the man's forehead.
Then… swish!
Blood splattered from the old man's forehead, leaving behind a perfectly round hole.
Thud. The old man dropped to his knees and died right in front of Anton.
But Anton's expression remained unchanged. Killing a person to him was as effortless as crushing an ant.
He turned around, got into the car, and drove away from the scene.
"Cut!"
Javier Bardem walked over to Ethan, while one of the lead actors, Josh Brolin, instinctively scooted away slightly.
"Director, how was it?" Javier Bardem asked curiously, watching the playback on the monitor.
"It was great," Ethan nodded. Working with talented actors made things so much easier. "But I think we can take it to another level."
"You mean…?" Javier Bardem listened intently.
"Be more serious," Ethan explained. "Right now, your performance is very relaxed, very casual… That's both right and wrong. Anton may not care about human life, but he treats the act of killing with a sense of ritual."
"He is pure evil. Everything about him originates from evil. He is evil. You need to find that feeling of being a true, principled villain. Or rather, you are death itself. Killing is his job. He does it effortlessly, not just with skill but with enjoyment."
Ethan paused for a moment and used his thumb to push up Javier Bardem's cheekbones, slightly lifting the corners of his mouth.
"Like this. You need to smile… Anton, you must replace your murderous intent with a smile. Give your prey the gentlest smile—then take their life without hesitation. Got it?"
"Yeah… I get it." Javier Bardem fell silent for a moment, closed his eyes, then suddenly opened them two minutes later, smiling.
"Perfect, just like that. Let's do another take."
The white car was forced to a stop once again.
"I need you to step out of the car."
"What is that?" The old man looked puzzled.
"I need you to step out of the car."
Anton gave a warm, friendly smile. His cheekbones lifted high, forming an eerie expression beneath his bowl-cut hair—like a nightmarish puppet.
The old man stepped out and looked at the bolt gun in Anton's hands. "What is that for…?"
"Please… please don't move." Anton raised a hand
to stop him from speaking and smiled again—a chilling, unsettling grin.
Then, still smiling, he pressed the trigger.
Thud. The old man collapsed lifelessly.
"Cut! That was perfect!"
Ethan called the scene, but the rest of the crew was still frozen, unable to snap out of it.
"My God," they muttered, staring at Javier Bardem with fear. It felt as if they were watching a real-life psychopath.
That smile—twisted, mocking, and laced with cruel amusement—seemed to crawl out from the depths of hell itself, overwhelming everyone with an unbearable sense of dread.
Even the elderly actor who had played the victim quickly scrambled to his feet and backed away from Javier Bardem.
"My God, really! When I saw his haircut and smile, I was terrified. He didn't even seem like he was acting. Honestly, you should take him straight to the police station!"
As he spoke, fake blood still dripped from his forehead, giving him the eerie look of a resurrected corpse.
The crew quickly stepped in to calm him down.
When Javier Bardem returned to Ethan's side, even Tom and the security team looked visibly uneasy.
To be honest, if this weren't a film set, they probably would have already drawn their guns and ordered him to lie face down on the ground.
His expression was simply too disturbing. He didn't look like someone who had never killed before.
Ethan, however, remained composed. He had seen this film in a past life and had anticipated such a performance.
But he could already imagine how this portrayal of a killer would leave audiences utterly shaken when it hit the big screen.
After finishing this scene, they moved on to Anton's other moments—like the convenience store scene where he flipped a coin to decide the clerk's fate and the deal scene where he wiped out the cartel's henchmen.
Anton's presence in the movie served one purpose alone: to kill. Throughout the film, he left a trail of blood, slaughtering both good and bad people alike.
This was one of the ways No Country for Old Men defied traditional storytelling.
Perhaps because Javier Bardem's performance as Anton was too convincing, a few funny incidents happened on set.
For example, during a break in filming, he wandered a few hundred meters away from the crew, still holding his signature weapon, in search of inspiration.
Since he was walking with his head down, dressed entirely in black, he looked surprisingly unassuming.
That was when two young Black men stopped him.
"Hey, man. If you don't want to get hurt, don't move. Hand over your wallet," one of them said.
One stood in front, playing with a knife, while the other pressed a concealed gun against Javier Bardem's waist.
In America, situations like this were common. Most people just carried twenty dollars in their pocket to quickly deal with street thugs.
Javier Bardem thought the same, so he lifted his head and gave them a warm smile. "No need to be so rude… I'll give you what you want…"
But the moment he smiled, the first guy immediately freaked out.
"FXXK! Run!" he screamed.
Without even thinking about his friend, he bolted as fast as he could.
The second guy looked completely lost. Meanwhile, Javier Bardem tilted his head slightly and smiled at him. "What's wrong?"
"Ahhh!" The second guy recoiled in terror, stumbling backward.
He fell to the ground, then scrambled to his feet and ran for his life, screaming, "Don't kill me! I'm sorry! I was wrong!"
In his panic, he left behind both his jacket and his gun.
Javier Bardem awkwardly picked them up and scratched his head. "Why do I feel like I just became the robber here?"
When he later recounted the story to the crew, everyone burst into laughter.
They joked that if he walked around New York with that haircut, he'd be surrounded by police cars in less than five minutes.