Sunday 22 January 2012

True Grit

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Year:2010
Country of origin:USA
Director:Ethan Coen, Joel Coen
Genre:Classy Western
Starring:Jeff Bridges, Hailee Steinfeld, Matt Damon, Josh Brolin
Rating:4/5
IMDB link:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1403865/
Tagline:Punishment comes one way or another
Favourite line:"Marshall Cogburn: How many men have you shot?"

Coen brothers reimagining of the vintage John Wayne movie - a movie I must confess to not having seen - the Coen's here claim to have taken the source novel as their reference point, ignoring the previous movie.

The plot:
A young girl hires a drunken Marshall to track down the man guilty of murdering her father.

A simple enough plot device for quite a simplistic movie, albeit one that is beautifully made.
The Coen's eye for detail and mastery of crafting the perfect shot is certainly present and correct, so hats off to cinematographer Roger Deakins, who has been with them since way back when with Barton Fink.
Bridges is as engaging a screen presence as ever as the grizzled Rooster Cogburn, but the star turn truly is young Hailee Steinfeld as Mattie Ross, the Coen's having unearthed a real gem, her maturity of performance more becoming an actress in her late twenties, early thirties than a thirteen year old girl.
Truly remarkable.
Whilst not the Coen's finest work, it is nevertheless accomplished and engaging and, besides, it's quite heart-warming to see a good old fashioned Western back on the big screen.

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