True Grit
…for this Coen brothers film which is totally not a Coen brothers film. Where is the absurdity, where is the over-the-top black humor, where is the desperation in the human condition, where is Frances McDormand? None of these things are to be found in this movie and surprisingly enough, that makes it great. The Coen brothers still love their characters and portray them in their usual deep fashion, and perhaps the combination of Mattie and Rooster is more brilliant than any other Coen brothers character because most of them had to act alone (think of the Dude or Javier Bardem in “No Country for Old Men”) whereas we get a rare glimpse of constant interaction and something like character development, fairly unusual in these Coen brothers films.
Apart from that though, “True Grit” is probably the most ‘boring’ one of their films – it’s based on a relatively generic book and is some sort of remake of a popular old movie, what can you expect? I don’t even want to delve into why the Coen brothers would make a “normal western” at this point in their career and will definitely not want to blame them for reaching a larger audience. In fact, I couldn’t care less, because “True Grit” left me with this amazingly good feeling after watching a film that I haven’t had for a long time. Since I have a tendency to watch films that are either just entertaining (and thus often lack artistic merit) or films that are just smart or artsy (and thus are, almost by definition, not very happy), I rarely have a film where I’d think “Wow this was good” at the same time as getting this giddy happy feeling that feel good movies like “Golden Slumber” would provide. Somehow that makes me want to watch “Good Will Hunting” now. At least it used to be a feel good movie for me – I have no idea what I would think today. Perhaps the film would bore me?
The rather unexplicable feel good factor coupled with the Coen brothers’ great filmmaking are what make this film so special, almost a miracle for me. It makes this film outshine all those movies like “Fargo” or “No Country for Old Men” or even “Burn After Reading” which have many great characters, wonderful dialogue and in general a much greater depth than “True Grit”. At the end of the day, I would say that I am a simple person after all, and I like these simple, almost generic stories which entertain me. It seems the mixture of Dude x Western genre was exactly perfect in this film.
I still think that “The Big Lebowski” was the best Coen film, among the ones I have seen so far, and if I had to give a recommendation, that would definitely be my first, as I also doubt that “True Grit” will ever attain the cult status despite or maybe because it was so popular at the box office. Ultimately this is a film that is somewhat less meaningful but tells a good story. In that respect it’s a shame, but I enjoyed it very much.