The Return of Rooster

True Grit

4.5 stars out of 5

When one thinks of the western movie genre, the works of John Ford, John Sturges, or Sergio Leone are probably first to come to mind for many people. These men excelled at exceptional films which could be considered pure westerns. The Joel and Ethan Coen are generally not filmmakers one associates with the great American western ... or at least, not before now.

The directing duo enter new territory in their newest film, a remake of the classic 1969 western, True Grit, staring John Wayne. The Coen Brothers briefly entered the genre in their 2007 Best Picture winner, No Country for Old Men, however, even that film could not be labeled a pure western. In fact, most Coen films are never easy to label in any genre. Their comedies are dark - often satirical in nature - and filled with eccentric characters more likely to be found in a screwball comedy. Their dramas are gritty journeys into realistic situations, most often associated with crime, and always laced with the signature humor audiences have come to expect from Hollywood's favorite brothers.

Their updated version of the film that won the Duke his Oscar is less a romanticism of the frontier and more a story of the virtue of unfaltering determination - even if it is a determination to get revenge for a murder. Like the original, the film follows 14-year old Mattie Ross (Hailee Steinfeld) as she organizes her late father's affairs and sets out to see his murderer, Tom Cheney (Josh Brolin), hanged. Told of three marshals who could assist her in her mission, Mattie chooses Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges), who has a history of catching almost all of those he pursues and returning them to authorities already dead. Cogburn - sporting an eye-patch, a bottle of whiskey, and cigarettes - is not one for taking on a little girl as his employer. However, "the fight" in her slowly wins him over. The two are joined in their "coon hunt" - as Cogburn refers to it - by LeBoeuf (Matt Damon), a self-interested Texas Ranger also looking for Cheney.

Damon and Brolin are more comic foils for the film. Damon's pompous ranger shows himself to be more a fool than an intellectual, using big words and Latin-based legal terms when voicing his thoughts. Of course, he fails to impress either the marshal or Mattie, who is well-educated and naturally exudes her smarts. Damon's somewhat over-the-top accent and emphasis on LeBoeuf's sense of self is sometimes annoying and inappropriate to the story, but serves a convenient balance in mood. Brolin plays Cheney as a nitwit with very little self-control, reacting suddenly and without conscious thought to various situations (from the murder of Mattie's father to the climactic ending).

If Damon and Brolin are the film's stock characters, then Bridges and Steinfeld share the role of Grit's protagonists. Bridges' version of Cogburn is arguably better than that of the Wayne's. Bridges is more ... well, gritty in his performance. While was was trying to create a offbeat, but lovable hero, Bridges' is trying to create an aging, drunken, overweight, profane western lawman, who is hard to truly like, much less love. Not to say that Cogburn does not win over the audience. The Coen dialogue written for Cogburn is never short of humor or respect. Bridges is easily one of the best actors of the year - if not the best - once again. Joining Bridges during the awards season will be Steinfeld, who not only hold her own opposite a legendary actor and character, but delivers one of the greatest breakthrough performances of any actor in the past decade. Two early scenes in the film of Mattie negotiating the sale of her father's horses with the town's trader (Dakin Matthews of Gilmore Girls fame) include the most entertaining straight dialogue in the movie. At 14, Steinfeld would not be the youngest actress to receive her share of acting award nominations, but she could be one of the youngest to actually win them.

Another of the film's stars is cinematographer Roger Deakins, who's touch makes True Grit one of the most beautiful films of 2010 and, indeed, one of the most visually attractive films in the Coen Brothers' entire filmography. Deakins' past work includes some of the most gorgeous films of the last decade (i.e. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Doubt, In the Valley of Elah, and the Coens' own No Country for Old Men and O Brother, Where Art Thou?). Unfortunately, Deakins has often been ignored come awards season. With True Grit, Deakins is the man to beat in his category this year.

True Grit proves that sometimes - though, rarely - remakes can give moviegoers a refreshing and terrific product.