True Grit 2010
I never saw the original True Grit or ever read the book. I didn’t even know the story other than a few things I learned by reading movie reviews. I knew the setup about a bossy teenaged girl who hires some lawmen to hunt down the man who killed her father. And I enjoyed the story and the characters. They are kind of eccentric which fits pretty well with a Coen brothers movie and I really enjoyed the highly mannered speech of pretty much everyone in the movie. I don’t know if this came from the book or if it is a Coen brothers flourish (I suspect the latter).
The story itself is fairly simple and takes very few twists and turns. In fact the movie isn’t even very long and my biggest complaint is the last 20 minutes which seems to be from a different movie altogether, having nothing to do with the rest of the movie, and serving only to provide an unexpected level of tragedy. Even if that part follows the book, I am not letting anyone off the hook, because they should know it doesn’t belong. The fact that the movie would have been barely over an hour long without the tacked on ending, makes the tacked on ending seem that much more tacked on. And for me it completely ruins the movie. Without that, I would have given an A- because of the strong characters and dialogue, subtracting only a little for the simple story. But because of the ending I can’t possibly recommend it (except to say that after the story is resolved with the main bad guy, just leave and you can enjoy a short A- movie) and will give it a C.
Written: 19 Jan 2011