As No Country for Old Men surfs the wave of critical and audience approval, the Coen Brothers have once again captivated popular imagination. The brilliant brotherly duo haven’t generated this much buzz since Fargo, and with Golden Globe nominations and hints of Oscar success, the Texas-set adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s novel has succeeded in resurrecting the Coens’ star. In comparison to their widely praised earlier productions, Intolerable Cruelty and the remake of The Ladykillers were considered to be a step back for the duo (though to be fair, The Ladykillers did contain many laughs and an excellent performance from Tom Hanks that made you forget Alec Guinness’s equally eccentric display in the 1955 Ealing classic) and with No Country for Old Men, two of the greatest talents working in the movies are seemingly back at the top of their game.

With a great ability to tell stories and transmit them through stylish cinematography, Joel and Ethan are two of most exciting filmmakers of modern times. In a way, just like Quentin Tarantino who similarly catapulted to infamy in the early ‘90s indie outbreak, the pair are masters of postmodernism. With a high-degree of devotion and knowledge of old films, the Coens take genres and twist them, playing with and updating past models through imaginative vision and extremely strong screenwriting. Unoriginal and self-indulgent? When the results are as awesome as The Hudsucker Proxy (Frank Capra-esque screwball comedy), The Big Lebowski (noir-tinged slacker comedy), Miller’s Crossing (hardboiled classic gangster homage) and O Brother, Where Art Thou? (old-south version of Homer’s Odyssey) then no: absolutely not.

With No Country for Old Men, Joel and Ethan return to the same kind of ‘crime in the wilderness’ setting of Fargo and Blood Simple, and judging by the rapturous reception that the film has received, they’ve once again managed to hit the mark. As usual when someone releases something a bit special that gets everyone raving, people start questioning: “so, what next?” As productive, creative types the Coens already have several projects on the go, but it was with great gusto that pair recently revealed that they’ve been writing a gory spaghetti western that “won’t be for the faint-hearted”. We’re promised a lot of torture and a chicken - intriguing and unnerving sounding stuff. Can the Coens pull off a spaghetti western? There’s no doubt that they are gifted guys and their track record attests to an ability to make dark, complex, violent tales. But will their Western vision be a true spaghetti gunslinger flick or will it simply be a stylish modern movie that alludes to and acknowledges old genre codes, much like Kill Bill?

How do you categorise something as a spaghetti western? As usual with genre considerations, it’s not entirely clear, but if the brothers Coen really want to go all out and make an authentic movie in the mould of Sergio Leone and Sergio Corbucci’s masterworks then there are a few rules and guidelines they could follow. Firstly: no nostalgic all-American sentiment is allowed. In contrast to the straight-forward ‘good vs. evil’ plotting and patriotic patter of the conventional Hollywood Western, the counterparts characteristically churned out of continental Europe were much more ambiguous with their morals and messages. The spaghetti western film doesn’t concern itself with archetypal cowboy heroes and shiny positive symbolism. This is a place for debunking the myths - a place for hinterland darkness and anti-heroes with ugly motives and seamy character facets. See the subversive casting of good old Henry Fonda as Frank in Once Upon a Time in the West - one of the most black-hearted baddies in cinema ever.

Ugliness and low-budget murk is essential in the whole spaghetti western experience. No $800 dollar fake blood for the brothers here (as apparently was the cost for the red stuff used on No Country for Old Men); what you need is cheap red paint for the numerous outbreaks of brutal, splattering bloodshed. Keeping things conventionally unpretty, you only have to look at the vast cast of sinister villains in Leone’s Dollars trilogy to see what the protagonists of this genre are meant to look like. Klaus Kinski’s humpbacked hoodlum in For a Few Dollars More is a prime example and the higher the number of nasty figures with sweat-drenched faces, filthy clothes and even filthier souls you can fit into the movie, the better the film will be. Film ‘em all in sleazy-looking technicolour mixing between scenic landscape shots and extreme close-ups of their seedy mugs and you’ve aesthetically evoked the old-school spaghetti western. Now, use the distinctive style to flesh out what should be a narrative of death and retribution, and top it off with slow-burning suspenseful build-up to the rapid-fire set-pieces and shootouts.

To be totally truthful, the movie must be filmed in Europe; preferably in Italy or Spain (the fact that many of the top spaghetti westerns were actually filmed in Almería means that the term ‘Paella Western’ may be a more appropriate label). Low-budgets and continental location meant that the original genre flicks used actors from across Europe and as a result were filmed with cast members delivering their lines in their own mother tongue. Subsequent post-production dubbing (most of the time really patchy, sometimes just laughably bad) adds to the charm of the old spaghetti western movies. If the Coens really want to retread the turf of this genre, some intentional slapdash voiceovers and unsynchronised sound would be wonderful.

Simple as. All the Coens need to do then is rope in Ennio Morricone to contribute an evocative, unconventional score and they could have a modern equivalent of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly on their hands. Anyway, even if the end product isn’t a pure replication of the spaghetti westerns of the 1960s, the combination of the Coen Brothers and the coolest sub-genre on the Western spectrum is definitely something to get excited about. Bring on the sweaty outlaws and bloody shootouts!