The Coen Brothers are a fun writing/directing team to watch throughout these recent years. It seems every movie made is a counter-example to the previous film. Rather than over-reacting to their most recent critics though, this process strikes me as more internal; that they simply get tired of having the same production discussions for two productions in a row. In 2004, they had the light, ensemble remake “The Ladykillers.” Next was “No Country for Old Men,” a deep reflection on people disconnecting from the world around them. Then there was the hyper-energy farce, “Burn After Reading,” and then last year’s meandering, quiet-paced, “A Serious Man.” Appropriately, as an antithesis to “A Serious Man,” this year’s “True Grit” is direct in character ambitions, stakes, fears, and relationships while rising to a sense of grandeur.
The movie, adapted from a Charles Portis novel by the same name, is a striking departure from Coen Brothers’ cinema staples. In nearly all of their films, large amounts of money are at stake and act as the main motivation for several characters. Similarly, “No Country,” “Fargo,” “Blood Simple,” “Miller’s Crossing” and “Raising Arizona” have laconic, evil-incarnate villains. The absence of money and evil caricatures was a mature route to take for the filmmakers; the good guys became better minded and, more thankfully, the bad guys became more sympathetic.
The bickering bad guys in this film (played by Barry Pepper and Josh Brolin) act as a late counter-balance to the bickering good guys (Jeff Bridges and Matt Damon)—giving everybody plenty to play with. Most fun, Damon goes from smooth, Southern charmer to barely audible after a tongue-in-cheek beating and Brolin squints into the distance as a murderer so frustrated with his own ignorance that the world itself nearly brings him to tears. Brolin damn near stole my sympathy away from the tough-talking, 14-year old, Mattie Ross (played by Hailee Steinfeld).
Poor guy. He just needs a hug. And maybe money.
The tough-talking dialogue is immediately accessible and entertaining—perhaps enough to undercut Sorkin’s knife-edged poetry for the Oscar award. But the Coen’s also use a specific definition of grit in the script to find their thesis on the West and thus find a place among the Western film cannon. Early in their quest, Lebouf (Damon) tells the others that he once drank muddy water from a hoof print in the desert, he was so close to death. Cogburn (Bridges) responds with a disbelieving snort. By the end of the film though, this snort isn’t so much about Lebouf’s story being false as it is about the audacity of thinking the story is extraordinary. In the Coen’s Old West, being ‘gritty’ is being practical, not just in saving lives but in saving time. Of course, Lebouf drank humiliation out of the ground, that kind of practicality is what’s necessary to survive away from society. Cogburn, though, is past that point and will never be in any one place long enough to bother crawling. He keeps moving by repeatedly disregarding life on a near sociopath/Han Solo level. To him, once a person/horse/Taun-Taun is dead, their body is just a body and equal to its weight in firewood or information. This is a ‘grit’ that Mattie cannot replicate, and so cannot survive in the wild west; but for lacking Cogburn’s level of ‘grit,’ she can survive the urbanizing world as it enters the 20th century.
The film itself has moments of visual beauty unrivaled by any other Coen’s film. Obviously, “No Country” had similar vast wilderness, but it’s usually the content of the images (ex. dead dogs) that stick in people’s mind rather than in “True Grit,” where a man riding a horse becomes more than just seeing such a thing. The shots and cuts play with light and size so fluidly that they also seem like jokes for the person who sat on the mute button. In one instance, Cogburn finds the mineshaft he believes the baddies are hiding out in. He strolls into the frame within the frame (camera in the dark cave, Bridges standing in the entrance) with weight and power—perhaps even homaging John Wayne’s iconic doorframe shot in “The Searchers.” Cogburn holds out his hand cannon and fires into the cave. The recoil sends Bridges off-balance as we cut to a distant shot outside of the mineshaft entrance, revealing Bridges as a small, drunken, figure on the side of a cliff. Cogburn goes from threatening a cave to helpless in a valley in two film shots, firing only one himself.
[Spoiler for the next paragraph]
As a note of criticism, I felt Mattie climatic dilemma was watered down from the novel, wherein she falls into the snake pit, gets trapped, snakes come out and then Tom Chaney appears overhead, laughing—eventually shot by Cogburn. In the film, Mattie gets her revenge by personally shooting Chaney, negating the #1 risk of using Cogburn (that he shoots all of his criminals). Furthermore, we lose the sense of “ultimate worst-case scenario.”
[Spoiler over.]
Ultimately, the craft behind the film, the actors in front of the screen and the knowledge audiences can bring into the film all work together to make one of the most completely contained and balanced films of the year. The film’s energy sputters and even struggles a bit when Mattie and the others hang around town but it doesn’t last long. And the climax was slightly less everything than in the novel (as described in my ‘spoiler paragraph’), but these feel like small points against a mostly great film. It’s not the runaway success of perhaps the Coen’s bests, nor can we be assured of its future classic (or cult-classic) status, but when that becomes the concern, I think we can all sleep okay at night. Unless there are rattlesnakes under your bed. Damn, why did I say that?
This was 2 minutes late. Review = worthless
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