New True Grit Movie: Not Your Granddaddy's Version

Joel and Ethan Coen’s True Grit, which, though some scenes pay visual homage to Henry Hathaway’s popular 1969 movie version featuring John Wayne, actually owes more of its “gritty” toughness and reality to Charles Portis' 1968 novel. Whereas the original True Grit movie was like living in a modestly furnished cabin on the outskirts of town, this new update is akin to living in a bare cabin set in the wilderness and sleeping on the bare floor boards. Though the dialogue of this new movie is clever, it lives in the hard, scrabble wild west and not in a glorified one.

Fourteen-year-old farm girl Mattie Ross, played convincingly by 14-year-old actor Hailee Steinfeld, goes into town to make funeral arrangements and square her father’s business affairs on behalf of her mother. Mattie’s ulterior motive, however, is to find a lawman to avenger her father, who was shot down and robbed by farm hand Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin). After some inquiries for a lawman with “true grit,” she hires a Marshall Rueben J. "Rooster" Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to track down and capture Chaney.

In short order, Mattie learns “Rooster” is a drunken, quick trigger, rough riding ornery varmint who’s guarded against all who cross his path. In a brawl, Rooster will just as soon escalate a knife fight to a gunfight to keep the odds squarely in his favor, which explains why he has had to kill two dozen men. In one scene, which is perhaps a commentary about the attitudes of white Americans towards Native Americans, Rooster boots two Native American children for no apparent reason, although the children didn’t seem to register any ill-will or surprise at this action. On the positive side of the accounting ledger, however, “Rooster” Cogburn possess a rarefied tenacity, resilience, and resourcefulness, as well as an uncanny ability to discern the essential character of people. For better or worse, Mattie relies on Rooster to draw on all his positive and negative attributes, especially for meting out the mean brand of justice she believes deserving of her father’s killer.

However, Texas Ranger LeBoeuf, (played by Matt Damon) promises to deny Mattie her justice by capturing the outlaw Chaney for the reward money. Though LeBeouf is somewhat of a naïve boy scout, when it counts, he manages to muster some true grit.

And, of course, on her own terms, unwanted tagalong Mattie proves her own doggedness, shrewdness, and self-reliance and becomes a respected sidekick to Rooster. Though John Wayne’s Rooster Cogburn directly states that Mattie’s feistiness reminds him of himself, Jeff Bridges’ Cogburn is wary of making such emotional pronouncements, although his quick trigger finger speaks volumes of his fondness for Mattie. At the end of their brutal journey of confrontations and trials, we learn something special about each of the movies' characters, for, in this movie version, True Grit tests the true measure of men--or, in this case, men and a girl.

Jeff Bridges gives us a brilliant performance, one of the best of his career. Matt Damon is steady as the Texas Ranger. And Josh Brolin is pitch perfect as the sneaky, apprehensive outlaw. Given the fact that Hailee Steinfeld gives us a smart performance against the likes of Grammy Award winners Jeff Bridge and Matt Damon, and Grammy Award nominee Josh Brolin, True Grit has also shows us the mettle of a promising young actor who has a bright career ahead of her. I really like this movie a lot, more than I expected to. True Grit is a nearly perfect movie which merits five of five stars.