"True Grit": the review

Most reviewers of the Coen Brothers' 2010 Western, "True Grit," have tended to make one or both of the following moves: they've contrasted the new film with the 1969 John Wayne version, and/or they've contrasted the film with the Coen Brothers' other movies. They've noted that the new version is, if you'll pardon the pun, grittier than the John Wayne version, and that the new movie isn't the usual Coen Brothers exercise in self-conscious style and darkly humorous irony. I generally agree with these observations, so instead of delving into those same contrasts, I'd prefer to begin this review by noting some of the similarities I saw between the 2010 "True Grit" and Clint Eastwood's 1992 masterpiece, "Unforgiven."

Both movies proceed slowly and deliberately. Neither film begins as most modern action films would-- that is, with some sort of fight or chase scene to hook the audience. Instead, both movies are content to plod along, their plots unfolding at a leisurely pace, unpretentious camera work allowing the actors to act. At the same time, both movies offer us stories that build to crescendos pivoting on the meanness of the mean drunks inhabiting their centers.

Granted, Eastwood's mean drunk, William Munny, is orders of magnitude darker and nastier than Jeff Bridges's cheerfully murderous Rooster Cogburn ("Unforgiven" was rated R; "True Grit" was PG-13). Once Munny crawls into his bottle at the end of "Unforgiven," you know a lot of people are going to die. With Cogburn, you're never quite sure whether he can shoot straight. Despite these differences, however, both films thrive on a slow buildup of intensity, with their (anti)heroes coming through in the end.

They also see their central characters through young eyes. This is more true in "True Grit" than it is in "Unforgiven," of course: Mattie Ross narrates the story of her adventure with Rooster Cogburn, whereas the Schofield Kid joins the story after the beginning of "Unforgiven," and loses his nerve before the very end when he figures out that, unlike William Munny, he has no lust for killing. Still, the younger folks in both films view the older folks with a measure of awe, and as Jeff Hodges noted in his post on the Charles Portis novel True Grit, a great measure of love in Mattie's case.

I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. While I generally agree that this was an uncharacteristic effort by the Coen Brothers, I don't think they strayed too far from what they've done before. One signal trait of a Coen Brothers film is the verbal tic-- something you also see on "Saturday Night Live." The idea is that you give one or more characters a particular, and exaggerated, way of speaking, and then you repeat it ad nauseam. Think about the "OK, then"s of "Raising Arizona," or the "Oh, yah!" of the good citizens in "Fargo." "True Grit" accomplishes this same feat by making its characters, almost without exception, avoid the use of contractions. That, along with the subdued musical score by perennial partner-in-crime Carter Burwell, reassured me that I was watching a Coen Brothers film.

My buddy Dr. Steve gave the movie high praise, though he expressed some disappointment in Josh Brolin's decision to play Tom Chaney, the man who killed Mattie Ross's father and the object of her vengefulness, as a cartoonish oaf. I wasn't as turned off by Brolin's dramatic choice, though I'd agree that Chaney's silliness may have loosened some of the tension during the movie's climactic scenes. He could have been more sinister, especially given how large he loomed in Mattie's imagination.

Barry Pepper was hilariously filthy as Ned Pepper, the wool-chapped leader of the creatively named Ned Pepper Gang. Pepper, who famously portrayed the prayerful sniper in "Saving Private Ryan," is an extremely athletic actor; it wouldn't surprise me to learn he did his own horseriding stunts during the nighttime-ambush-at-the-cabin scene. I also have to wonder whether the actor's surname influenced the casting director's choice.

One of the more impressive cameos was by Ed Lee Corbin as The Bear Man, a dentist/trader/hunter who has manifestly spent too much time alone, and who speaks in a bizarre rhythm that defies all normal human cadence. It's The Bear Man who directs Rooster and Mattie to the cabin where we meet the ill-fated criminals Emmett Quincy and his partner, a quivering Methodist named Moon. (I had originally wondered whether the unstable Quincy had been played by Coen Brothers regular John Goodman, but the actor's face didn't fit Goodman's looks. As it turns out, Quincy was played by Paul Rae.)

Matt Damon did a fine job as LaBoeuf (pronounced "luh-BEEF" in the film, which tickled me), the Texas Ranger who loves to tell everyone he's a Texas Ranger. In the end, though, we discover that LaBoeuf, who is pursuing Tom Chaney for reasons of his own, isn't all talk: he's a crack shot at four hundred yards, which turns out to be a good thing for Rooster. If Rooster Cogburn is the movie's Han Solo, eager to charge headlong into danger, then Damon's LaBeouf, with his shaky loyalties, is its Lando Calrissian. With his tongue bitten part-way off after he's been lassoed and dragged a ways across dirt and rocks, poor LaBoeuf spends half the film sounding like an Art Buchwald wannabe. This, coupled with his multiple departures from the group ("Eighdee-os!"), adds a pitiful element to the comic relief.

Hailee Steinfeld's perky, feisty portrayal of Mattie Ross, the girl out to avenge her father's death, was about as note-perfect as it could be. In his review of the film, Roger Ebert wrote, "...few people would get a crush on Hailee Steinfeld." He wasn't calling the actress ugly-- she isn't-- but he was noting that Steinfeld's Mattie is a little pistol, intelligent and ruthlessly purpose-driven, not someone to be toyed or trifled with. The only time we see Mattie truly falter is the moment Rooster shoots her exhausted horse. Once the deed is done, words fail her, and all she can do is beat weakly against Rooster's arms as he picks her up and gasps his way across the plains, racing against time before Mattie is overcome by the snake venom in her veins.

For Steinfeld, who radiates alertness, confidence, and poise in her interviews, this couldn't have been a better breakout role. It showcased her ear for accents and her ability to rattle off lengthy lines of dialogue in a manner that somehow avoids the trap of stilted or overwrought speech. I predict she's got a great career ahead of her, as long as she can keep her head and not get sucked into the Hollywood vortex.

Finally, hats off to Jeff Bridges as ornery Marshal Reuben "Rooster" Cogburn, an ex-bank robber and downright rascal who faces death with a grim smile and more than a little liquid courage in his bloodstream. Bridges is older now, long past his Dude days, but he still had to be made up to look even crustier. In a Dude versus Duke comparison, it's hard to say whether it's Jeff Bridges or John Wayne who presents us with the more convincing or iconic or memorable Rooster Cogburn. I tend to think they're both on a par, with Bridges having the advantage of starring in a far better version of the story. I also think that, as delivered by Bridges, the 2010 Cogburn gets all the best lines in the movie.

"Shot? Or killt?"

If you haven't seen the new "True Grit" yet, git on out there and see it in theaters before it disappears entirely. All that gorgeous cinematography will be diminished on Blu-ray, no matter how huge your new flat-screen HDTV might be.

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