Over the weekend, CB and I actually met up (in the flesh!) and went to see True Grit. She’s a Matt Damon-aholic, and I’m a big fan of the Coen Brothers, so it seemed like an obvious pick. We both enjoyed the film – although I’m not sure how it fits into the pantheon of Coen Brothers films. Does it out-rate The Big Lebowski? Fargo? No Country For Old Men? Raising Arizona? Not really. It had a surprising amount of dark humor, and the acting and story were first-class… but I’m slightly unconvinced that this one will be considered one of their best. It seems more like the Coen Brothers wanting to make an old-fashioned western with Jeff Bridges, and they just accidentally made a good, crowd-pleasing movie.

The basic story (with no spoilers): Hailee Steinfeld’s character (Mattie Ross) hires US Marshall Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to track down her father’s murderer. Matt Damon plays the Texas Ranger who is hunting the same murderer, but for a different crime. Hailee and Jeff are the two leads of the film – Matt’s character is a true supporting player, and Josh Brolin plays the killer, and I was surprised with how small Brolin’s part was. Anyway, the story is basically about the journey of Rooster and Mattie to find the killer. Mattie is all of 14 years old – and she’s smart, sassy, tough and precocious as all hell. To be honest, she stole nearly every scene she was in, which is remarkable considering both Matt Damon and Jeff Bridges were basically playing hilariously cartoonish buffoons to varying degrees. Mattie is the emotional heart of the film, and she has wonderful chemistry with both of her leading men.

Things I loved about the film: Hailee Steinfeld’s film debut performance is a total knockout – she deserves every nomination she’s getting. I loved that they got an actual kid to play the kid, and I love that she doesn’t come across like she’s 14-going-on-40. I also loved Matt Damon, who is a great and confident enough actor to play second-fiddle to Hailee and Jeff Bridges. Late in the film, there’s a brief scene between Hailee and Matt where they are just speaking to each other and… it was my favorite scene of the film. Sigh… I would never take Matt away from CB, but I do love him too.

Things that I wasn’t crazy about: I love some Jeff Bridges, but I lost chunks of his dialogue because of the crazy voice he was doing. Maybe Jeff decided to do his voice like that so that people would come and see the movie for a second and third time just to understand what the hell he was saying. I also thought Josh Brolin was underutilized – but that’s probably because I really like him as an actor, and I always want to see more of him. Barry Pepper also had a small part in the film, and he too was underutilized. Also – and I’m really not saying this as a spoiler, but: I wanted a different resolution. I wanted a different ending. I didn’t hate the ending, I just thought it was going to end differently.

So… would I recommend True Grit? Of course. My favorite film of the year is still The King’s Speech, but don’t go into True Grit thinking that it’s just a boy movie, or a straight western. There’s a thick strain of feminism and one of the best female performances of the year. It’s also really, really funny and completely solid.

Promotional images courtesy of All Movie Photo.