Scott directs McCarthy’s screenplay with the almost-bored assurance of a man who knows just how to shoot a scene of visceral action, but can’t care enough to direct the ridiculously overwrought dialogue into not sounding hilariously campy (it certainly isn’t pitched for hilarity). The four creatively gory action set-pieces are the film’s high-points in terms of visual energy, with a muscularity that jolts some life into an otherwise self-consciously dour film. But everything in between feels dead, dead like the morally rotted world McCarthy portrays, but lacking the cosmic awe that McCarthy’s best work evokes. It’s all perfunctory, regurgitated nihilism plucked straight from his novels and put into the mouths of practically every character the Counsellor meets (including a Mexican bartender with little stake in the man’s fate). Even the film’s broad US/Mexico border landscapes seem flat and claustrophobic compared to the gorgeous, haunting vastness of No Country For Old Men. It all feels like parody, a companion-piece to No Country For Old Men that underscores every point that movie (and McCarthy’s entire bibliography) makes with a thick black marker so all that remains is a void, a black morass with a somewhat enticing synthetic reek. It’s almost exhilarating because of how little it cares to provide crowd-pleasing thriller fare. If this were a better movie, I’d be impressed by the courage of its convictions, but coming from two legendary artists past their prime, it just feels like a deeply self-indulgent disappointment.
The Counselor opens today in theatres. 
