True Grit

           

I’m often skeptical of Western Movies. I didn’t grow up with the manly man gentlemanly but still lone wolf don’t need no help gotta do whats right Clint Eastwood John Wayne people. I don’t feel the same nostalgia that my father and uncles seem to salivate over when they reminisce about John Wayne kicking ass and riding off, or when Clint whips out a really unnecessary and absolutely not standard issue weapons and proceeds to write his own laws in bullet holes. True Grit (2010) is my kind of Western, the good kind of Western.

           

            In short Mattie Ross (Hailee Stienfeld) is the young, but doesn’t act like it, tough and fiery girl that looks to hire an old, in every sense of the word, US Marshal Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to track down and kill her father’s murderer, Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin). And all of them play unique and authentic characters that grant weight and emotion to the film. Jeff Bridges is not a glorified Old West cowboy with that elegant sauve and Jame Bond swagger. He sports and old, dirty, patch beard and above it a worn out eye patch and you can tell just how he smells from the clothes he’s wearing. The one eyed former marshal is a stubborn drunk. Jeff Bridge’s character drags around like any man would if his life consisted of riding miles on horseback just to shoot some people, to get shot back at, to never have a real place that is home, to only own one set of clothes. It’s the real western enforcer, not the prettied super cowboy.  

            That dusty dirty drunken Cogburn is up against the straight, “just to watch it burn” kind of evil that I always compare to the Joker from Batman. The no respect, no loyalty, sometimes no motive, unadulterated evil that exits simply because it can. Josh Brolin’s character only earns any props from me just for how well he plays the role. And there is also Matt Damon’s character, LaBoeuf, the Texas Ranger after Chaney for other reasons but who teams up with Cogburn although not to either of their likings. The two battle each other on the road as we learn of the history of these two gunslingers animosity for each other.

            This story of the old souled and unshakable young girl alongside two unlikely and unfriendly heroes to take down a truly devilish man is a must watch. It’s a story of revenge, wit, growing and of course, grit.

4 out of 5