Why was Anton Chigurh being arrested at the beginning of the film?

Question

In No Country for Old Men, why was Anton Chigurh being arrested at the beginning of the film?

Answer 1

I don't know that I necessarily disagree with the other answer posted but I've read the book and seen the film and I don't think that an "explanation" can be copied so easily from one to the other. I found the difference in the way they treat the character of Chigurh is so great that the two stories are practically independent.

In the film, Chigurh is presented less as a character and more as a force of nature. He isn't a violent person, he is violence. He's not trying to prove anything to anyone, least of all himself, he just is. That otherworldly or mythical characterization is largely at odds with the book, in which Chigurh is represented as a thinking and morally capable character, albeit a psychopath.

It's pretty clear that the Coen Bros cut out the more human parts of Chigurh's character to emphasize/create a more elementally nightmarish creature. As such, I think that not only was the reason for the initial arrest not shown but it couldn't have been shown because having a reason--even a psychopathic reason like the one in the book--would undermine the terrifyingly arbitrary nature of Chigurh's character.

That's how I understand it. Perhaps if I reread the book and rewatched the film I would embrace the conventional wisdom. And perhaps not.

Answer 2

The film doesn't give us an answer, but the book does. Chigurh (as explained to Carson Wells in the novel) allowed himself to be arrested (he was pulled over after he left the scene) for killing a man in a parking lot after the man said something Chigurh didn't like. He (Chigurh) wanted to see if he could "will" his way out of the situation. Although the book and the movie screenplay differ in many ways, both are excellent. Unless there is a directors cut of the film, the reason for Chigurhs arrest is only available in the novel.