True Grit

Terrific: tough, exciting, funny, gorgeous and bewitchingly acted, this is darn close to perfection.

Smartly emphasizing Portis' quirky dialogue and dark comic tone, the Coens show the flare that made them famous.

This is a film by the Coen Brothers, and this is the first straight genre exercise in their career. It's a loving one. Their craftsmanship is a wonder. Their casting is always inspired and exact. The cinematography by Roger Deakins reminds us of the glory that was, and can still be, the Western.

For the most part, the Coens' is a highly enjoyable yarn, stocked with pungent bushwa and a full panoply of frontier bozos.

Rather than a case of the Dude doing the Duke, Bridges' irascible old cuss is a genuine original who feels larger than the familiar saga that contains him.

It isn't much of a contest: The clear winner is John Wayne, because the Coens are playing his game. The Duke couldn't do the Coens' sly in-jokes, but they've never been able to reach out and move the audience to heights of emotion. Before now, they've never tried.

The original western won John Wayne a puzzling and undeserved Oscar for finally falling off his horse. Don't expect the same miracle for Jeff Bridges. In the numbing hands of pretentious filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen, history does not repeat itself in any way whatsoever.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

Western in the style of Coen The fact that the Coen brothers are making a movie in the western genre definitely stems from the importance of the western in the history of cinema. True courage is a well-made film in this genre, which has both western elements and the signs of the Coen brothers' cinema.

As remakes go pretty good, but it is still a remake. So it loses points for originality. The ending was to dragged out and ended up way to dour for my liking.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

I have to admit that, before watching the film, I wasn't a fan of the original and was surprised that anyone thought it deserving of a remake. The original was far too much of a comedy for what was supposed to be a revenge film and Kim Darby's performance was far too cartoonish. I imagined that the Coens would probably go far in the other direction and create an extremely violent film that might better fit the theme of revenge. I was surprised to see how little their vision differed from the original and how poor the acting was. Jeff Bridges played a caricature of all his recent performances and was unintelligible for long stretches. His chemistry with Maddy was non-existent, partially because she was again portrayed as a one-note "girl with spunk" rather than as a real character whose moods and reactions change with the action. If she's an interesting film character, it's because she's a young woman driven by physical revenge - not because she "spunky". I'm stunned by the critics' accolades for her performance, which was most notable for its unrealistic staccato line delivery, especially in her repartee with the horse dealer. I realize that, at 14, the Coens were responsible for her performance, but it was painful. If there's ever been a less credible portrayal of a Texas Ranger than Matt Damon's, I thankfully haven't seen it, and wouldn't want to. I had the sense that he knew it wasn't working but couldn't back out in mid-film. His accent wavered by the minute. Though the role was as cartoonish as in the original, Glen Campbell captured the persona far better. Though I almost missed Josh Brolin's performance because I occasionally have to blink, his 6 lines of dialogue were delivered with a bizarre, raspy growl for no apparent reason. (Matt Damon marvels at Brolin's inspired delivery in an accompanying commentary!) Barry Pepper's performance is the best in the film, but even then it's bizarre to see him perfectly mimic Robert Duvall down to the voice. Again, as in so many points in the film, you just wonder "why bother"? Though the original was far from a great film and far from Wayne's best, it was better than this remake. The original actors were better in their roles, and even Kim Darby's Maddy - cartoonish as I found her -shared an obvious affection for John Wayne that was glaringly missing from the remake.