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EAGLE
PASS
No Country
for Young Men Either
or
Looking for the Coen Brothers
By Chris Adams |
Silly
me. I went to Eagle
Pass last week expecting to see locations used in the film No
Country for Old Man. Although it has since been removed, a perfunctory
check of filming locations at IMDb did indeed list Eagle
Pass. And I assumed, since a hotel in the film was called "Hotel
Eagle" (or was it Eagle Hotel? I've only seen this film three times
now) and the events of the film and Cormac McCarthy book are set in
Eagle
Pass, on the Texas/Mexico
border, that I would indeed find the things I expected to see.
"Moss pulled into
Eagle
Pass at a quarter till two in the morning. He'd slept a good part
of the way in the back of the cab and he only woke up when they slowed
coming off the highway down Main Street. He watched the pale white
globes of the street lamps pass along the upper rim of the window.
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Then he sat up.
You goin across the river? the driver said.
No. Just take me downtown.
You are downtown.
Moss leaned forward with his elbows on the back of the seat.
What's that right there?
That's the Maverick
County Courthouse.
No. Right there where the sign is.
That's the Hotel Eagle.
Drop me there." (No Country for Old Men, pp. 106, 107)
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But no. It turns
out that most of the filming was done in Las Vegas, New Mexico.
Imagine that - things in a movie not reflecting reality....So, no
Plaza Hotel. No Serf Theatre. But here is what I did find in Eagle
Pass. First of all, there was the decidedly tropical Maverick
County Courthouse. It was constructed in 1885, and is Romanesque
Revival style with Second Empire influences. The lovely paint scheme
is from 1926.
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| I saw the name
"Hesles" several times while in Eagle
Pass, including on this motel near the downtown area and border
crossing, complete with eclectic birdhouse collection: |
| The Aztec Theatre,
which was built around 1915 and closed in 1982. It is mentioned in
the novel: |
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"He loped
wincing down the sidewalk past the Aztec Theatre. As he passed the
little round ticket kiosk all the glass fell out of it. He never
even heard that shot." (No Country for Old Men, p. 114)
Eagle
Pass
had a Kress
at one time, in front of which there was wooden pavement as recently
as 1963:
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| More recently,
it appears one could shop at the "De Todo Todo Todo Todo" (promises,
promises) y "Mi Casa" and what might have been a Kress warehouse(?): |
| Back in January
2008 when these pictures were taken, the drug cartel violence, which
continues today, had begun to make the national news, so it was slightly
disturbing to see this: |
| Corner of Main
and Bibb (note Aztec Theatre): |
| These last two
shots are my favorites of what I captured while there. It was extremely
cold at this point, and I was feeling "brave" being out on Main Street
at that particular hour: |
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