The Difference Between The Coen Bros.' TRUE GRIT And John Wayne's TRUE GRIT
Jeff Bridges will be having a great holiday season. He’s got TRON: LEGACY and The Coen Bros.’ TRUE GRIT coming to theaters next month. The other day I watched Bridges on TV advocating the fight against kids’ hunger and poverty. No wonder he won that Oscar (even thought Firth deserved it more), Bridges is just a very likable dude, he’s The Dude. And I’m bettin’ he’ll get another Oscar nod for his take on Marshal Rooster Cogburn. But there have been questions about how similar The Coens’ version will be compared to the 1969 movie that gave The Duke John Wayne his Oscar win. We know that the Coens’ insisted that theirs is more faithful to the book than the old movie and via Screenjunkies and Latinoreview, co-star Barry Pepper (Saving Private Ryan, We Were Soldiers) who plays the character Lucky Ned Pepper couldn’t agree more. This is how he explained it and heads up, it contains SPOILER…
“All I knew was that the Coen Brothers were making True Grit and they were going to make a pure adaptation of the book,”
“So I thought it had nothing to do with the original film which I had never seen so I thought there’s no point in watching the film if they’re going to adapt the book. [The book] follows the Mattie Ross character, unlike the John Wayne picture… it follows the Mattie Ross character faithfully. She’s really the point of view, the main protagonist of the picture whereas when John Wayne did the film, he sort of adapted it to be more about the Rooster Cogburn character.”
“Eventually he and I do have the sort of famous shootout in the end so it’s a lot of fun,”
“He’s sort of the bandit chief of this gang of bank robbers but it’s the Josh Brolin character, Tom Chaney, that has killed young Mattie Ross’s father. So he’s with us in the mountains in our hideout and we’ve just robbed this train. We have all the loot up in the mountain and up comes Rooster (Bridges) after us.”
Those of you who’ve seen the 1969 movie… do you think Pepper’s observation is correct? What about those of you who’ve read the book.. what do you think?
14-year-old Mattie Ross’s (Hailee Steinfeld) father has been shot in cold blood by the coward Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin), and she is determined to bring him to justice. Enlisting the help of a trigger-happy, drunken U.S. Marshal, Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges), she sets out with him — over his objections — to hunt down Chaney. Her father’s blood demands that she pursue the criminal into Indian territory and find him before a Texas Ranger named LeBoeuf (Matt Damon) catches him and brings him back to Texas for the murder of another man.
TRUE GRIT opens December 25th, 2010
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Hmmm, can I just say that if this film purports to be told from the perspective of Mattie, following her as the main protagonist and not Rooster, then why did they cast Rooster with the current winner of Oscar’s Best Actor but Mattie with a virtual unknown?
Cuz the Coens like Bridges and outside of John Goodman (who has a lot of weight as well so fits well for the character too)…he’s the only one that can resemble the part. Awards mean nothing to the Coens. Tbey started developing the film in March 2009. Casting started around Sept. and October. So…yeah…they didn’t care about award winning actors.
I just saw the movie. I was blown away. the movie has a tonal difference. the films are very different saving plot. characters are different and humor comes from the truth of the situation. I felt like the humor in the 69 film was derived primarily from John Wayne. the drunk surly marshal in the coen film is someone to be pitied. rooster in the coen film is like wayne until the courtroom. we are lead to believe that rooster has killed in cold blood. we also see rooster as a washout. he has no real friends and no real family he is alone. also, the coen film is about the girl not about rooster. I feel that if you were to see this film you would see a film that is true in it’s attempt to tell a story and not a vehicle for a screen personality.
My husband and I both loved the new movie, I’ll take it over the 1969 version any day. It really shows the depth that movie makers go to in today’s storytelling to bring us the era as it was, the dirt, the grim, the reality of their lives (to a point.) The casting of Jeff Bridges drew me to the film, the performance of Hailie Steinfeld was amazing and will keep me watching her (hopefully) for years to come. Excellent film. Song during the credits grated on my nerves.