Review of True Grit (2010) by Spencer S — 29 Jul 2013

Remakes are supposed to bring something new to the table, a re-imagining of the same story in a new fashion, maybe even carrying your own visual trademark as long as it fits into the whole concept, unless you as a filmmaker are convinced that the original film version was weak and needs a reconstruction process.

The Coen brothers, unfortunately, did not do anything new. Since it is a remake of a story made before (it is actually more a new adaptation than a remake, which is more attached to the original novel), True Grit is meant to be compared with Hathaway's classic.

- Pacing problems is the gravest concern here. No satisfactory character development is given this time for perceiving the motivations of the characters as believable. Events happen with no previous explanation whatsoever.

- Given the previous point, the actors are forced to stick to a poor screenplay and cannot expand their true talent (heh). Characters are flat and performances forgettable.

- The original classic is technically superior both in the music and in the cinematography departments.

- The Coen brothers have a trademark style, as I mentioned in the opening paragraph, and they applied it here. Those wide-lens shots and uncomfortable silences did not help to create an atmosphere of suspense or isolation no matter how well done they were; on the contrary, you could almost think that a dark humor joke was about to begin. Those shots should stick to the dark humor movies of the Coen's filmography.

- The Coen brothers have definitely proved that it is John Wayne, and not an old, annoying and drunk "Dude" the true "one-eyed fat man with true grit".

- Hailee Steinfeld is miles behind the performance of Kim Darby. Once again, I blame the written adaptation more than the cast. Characters were round in the 1969 version, not here. They are monotonous.

- The ending, unlike the classic, is more realistic, dramatic, even nostalgic, if you wish. That is the ending I would approve conceptually. But guess what? I stopped caring about the characters way before the conclusion showed up, so the ending practically didn't matter. Therefore, I preferred the original ending, not because of being a fan of happy endings, but because given the adventure story and the characters Hathaway created, it was a perfect closure to the characters evolution, to the maturity process of Mattie Ross and to the emotional side of Rooster Cogburn. You could even create a whole new story with that ending, following the adventures of such unique pair. In here, there is no payoff.

The facts that Coen's version is darker and that it was more accurate to the novel are not synonyms of being a better feature. It simply means that it was intended to done differently, and I thank Ethan and Joel for it. Still, I'll stick to South Korean westerns, even if they are sporadically parody-like, given that they offer refreshing ways to retell stories that the Western culture could never even think of. This western gave me almost the same issues 3:10 to Yuma (2007) did. Reviving the Old West is an honorable intention, but it is not enough.

66/100.