Wow! I hadn’t expected much but this is a fantastic movie. Lots of Academy Award nominations are coming.
True Grit (Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, Hailee Steinfeld, Josh Brolin) – Easily one of the best films of the year, this remake of the 1969 John Wayne movie of the same name is a true tour de force. Whether you are a fan of cowboy movies in general or the original True Grit, this Coen Brothers’ adaptation features four of the best performances I have seen since the Brothers Coen’s No Country for Old Men (whose cast, of course, included Josh Brolin).
The revelation here is young Hailee Steinfeld as Mattie Ross, the 14 (going on 30)-year-old seeking revenge for her father’s death at the hands of Tom Chaney (Brolin). She enlists the services of has-been, drunken U.S. Marshall Reuben “Rooster” Cogburn (Bridges), the meanest, baddest, shoot-first-and-ask-questions-later lawman. Filled with self-confidence and an (unrealistically) incredible vocabulary, she is a master negotiator who is singularly focused on getting the guy who killed her father. She leaves her mother and her two siblings back home in Arkansas as she sets out first to bury her father and then avenge his death. The reluctant Cogburn finally agrees to Mattie’s $50 offer and heads out into Indian country to find Chaney. But he doesn’t go alone. He joins up with Texas Ranger La Boeuf (not Shia, which is LaBeouf), who is also after Chaney for killing a legislator in Texas. La Boeuf (Damon), whose name is pronounced “La Beef “throughout the film, is headstrong and competent, but he doesn’t approve of Cogburn’s methods and, more importantly, doesn’t like it when Mattie tracks them down and insists on joining the search. The movie brilliantly explores both the development and the evolution of the relationships among these three characters.
Bridges is positively brilliant. A second-in-a-row Academy Award nomination is a sure thing; a follow-up win is very possible. Damon is great but I never forgot that I was watching Matt act the Le Boeuf character. Steinfeld also should be a shoo-in for a nomination from my perspective and should be the first minor since Abagail Breslin to get an Oscar nod. Brolin is more of a long shot because his part is very small though he is great as the unrepentant Chaney. The part seems bigger than in the original movie where cowboy veteran Jeff Corey played the Chaney role. Everyone remembers that John Wayne won his one and only Oscar (he was nominated for two others) for the Cogburn role. Many, including me, felt it was more of a lifetime achievement award). Few remember it was crooner Glen Campbell in the Texas Ranger role in the original. Kim Darby played Mattie wonderfully, but not this well, in the 1969 edition.
Boosted by a wonderful score and potentially an Oscar-worthy song in “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms,” sung by Iris DeMent and written in 1887 (it first appeared in the Mickey Rooney film, The Human Comedy, in 1943), True Grit features great cinematography of western landscapes in New Mexico and Texas. There is nothing film goers won’t love above True Grit (except maybe three violent scenes) so put this one on your must-see list for the holiday season.