True Grit (1969)

For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

John Wayne's bulldozing performance as eye patch-wearing Marshall Reuben J. Cogburn (a.k.a. "Rooster") is the centerpiece of the old-fashioned western "True Grit"; without Wayne, it would have been utterly unremarkable. Based on Charles Portis' novel, story involves the crusty Marshall being hired by a feisty juvenile to track down the band of killers responsible for her father's death. Though the movie is spirited and fairly enjoyable, and the Duke does some fun overplaying, the script is thin and director Henry Hathaway goes heavy on the corn. As the impertinent Mattie Ross, Kim Darby's impatient manner and bossy voice are fun qualities at first, but there's too much of her (there's also too much of Glen Campbell and Jeff Corey in support). Wayne's Oscar win for Best Actor was seen as a sentimental pick in 1970, and time has done little to change that perception. He reprised his role for the 1975 sequel, "Rooster Cogburn". Warren Oates took the lead in a later TV series. **1/2 from ****

True Grit http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065126/ 1969: This movie is the culmination of John Wayne's entire carrier and in my opinion is his way of saying goodbye to us all right down to when he jumps that rail with his trade mark beautiful long legs horses; of which I have painted many times over. I have also painted the background in this movie including my four foot by 3 foot acrylic on wood the fall painting: http://radmanart2ndhome.blogspot.com/ Every minute of every moment of the 1969 movie; True Grit make, me want to cry; it is so perfectly done. Every human being in this live deserves revenge on someone; this is much apart of this life as we shall all live. Whether or not you have a mental disorder and think you can take that revenge yourself is a rare if non existent fact. Hopefully you see the reason that revenge is best rot by the law, or God himself.I hold no quarter in proclaiming; if I should name a real life movie character; that is my real life hero; it was John Wayne. In the move True Grit; I also name that person to be Glen Campbell a great hero as well. Please do your homework and check out John Wayne's library of movies to prove my point and like listening to Marylyn Masons first 3 CD's and saying he is no good, you better wake up. Compared to John Wayne you must be ignorant or just plane stupid, to say John Wayne is not a real life hero of the silver screen. See the movie The Searches http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049730/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_44 to bring what I said right to your heart. I let this movie speak for itself. Now to go give the remake a very bad review something I have never done. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1403865/

Just watched it on TV for about the eighth time. The film is a masterpiece. Just as was the novel on which it is based, written in the language of the story's historical context in a quite extraordinary way. John Wayne's and Kim Darby's performances are faultless, and the Texas Ranger is not bad either. And what about the music by Elmer Bernstein? Just looked him up to find - not surprisingly - that he was a pupil of Aaron Copland. What had struck me before were the unexpected echoes of Bartok, which fit with the action quite brilliantly.I don't know whether the film stock has been re-jigged in some way since the film was first made, or whether I now have a better television, but the quality comes up lovely. When the modern remake by the Coen brothers came out it got a lot of praise for greater authentic atmosphere and truth to the novel. Not by me. Give me a hero who doesn't mumble, for starters. And the compressed ending of the 1969 film is better than the long-winded one of the novel. The new film has its merits, certainly, but it does not replace the Wayne/Darby mini-epic.

I never liked John Wayne as a kid and never much liked westerns. This movie didn't turn me around but let's say that it made me stop and change my mind for 128 minutes. I saw it on TV in Spain a couple years go (Valor del Ley is the Spanish title) and I was struck by the majestic beauty of the locations. I also went back and reread the fantastic book upon which the film is based and from which comes every great word of dialogue.The book is narrated in the no-nonsense, straightforward fashion you would expect from a good journalist, as Portis was before he gave it up to write fiction full-time. He has a great ear for dialogue and he obviously researched the speech of the era as there are many phrases and words that are now out of use or just impossible to invent. Folks just plain spoke different back then, something Portis was keen on having us hear. Take this little exchange:"I don't believe you have fifty dollars, baby sister, but if you are hungry I will give you supper and we will talk it over and make medicine. How does that suit you?"I said it suited me right down to the ground.I just don't think you could make up a line like "right down to the ground." That Portis was a newspaper reporter shows in his attention to details like this small one (but all details, big and small, are important, of course). I suppose that I take more notice to Portis' ventures in language because I am up to my own eyebrows learning Spanish and I subconsciously am translating everything I hear and read into castellano, as it is called here, mostly. And evidently Portis was a bigger fan of the Duke than I because he wrote the character of Rooster Cogburn with him in mind. The author also had a fair ear for humor of which the novel and both movies abound.I found myself one pretty spring day in Las Vegas, New Mexico, in need of a road stake and I robbed one of them little high-interest banks there. Thought I was doing a good service. You can't rob a thief, can you? I never robbed no citizens. I never taken a man's watch." "It is all stealing," said I."That was the position they taken in New Mexico."At least both sets of film makers have enough wisdom to recognize the wisdom in the book.The original movie certainly isn't perfect, not by a long shot. But any criticism of it would be like criticizing the way people talked back in the 1880's. Films are different today, mostly better in my opinion. There are some problems in the 1969 version with some of the side characters and bad acting. The musical score is sometimes bombastic and annoying. The first five minutes which recount the murder of Mattie's father are tiresome and have been wisely excluded in the Coen brothers' remake. More than anything the 1969 movie is absolutely gorgeous from start to finish. The old movie has a better and more satisfying ending than the new one which follows the book more closely. The old movie is pure Hollywood, not always a pejorative, especially in this case."You're too old and too fat to be jumping horses." "Well come and see a fat old man sometime."