There have been times in their careers when the Coen Brothers have taken time off from making astonishing movies to make very good ones. The Hudsucker Proxy emerged from one of these periods as did The Man Who wasn’t There. True Grit is the latest.
On first glance, this seems like a vessel built from borrowed lumber. Jeff Bridges admirably reprises his Lebowski role (a useless man who is startled to find that he is useful), while Matt Damon strings out his famous Matthew McCanaughey impression to feature length. It will also be noted that this latest offering from the eclectomanic Coen’s is their second Western in three or four years.
None of this knowledge dampened my enjoyment of the movie at all. This is far from rehash. In fact, it slowly dawned on me as I watched, this is perhaps one of the most truthfully Coenish things they’ve ever done. It plays to their strengths perfectly: It is hysterically dark and appallingly funny. The setting also allows them to experiment with language in a way that has often sat uneasily in their other movies. Who the fuck knows how these 19th Century nutjobs spoke after all? I’m pretty sure it was well peculiar.
Intelligent Westerns have been the order of the day in recent years, and the fad has served up some good movies and some bad movies. Over the past decade we’ve seen Home on the Range, Brokeback Mountain, The Three Burials of Melchiadez Estrada and of course No Country for Old Men. So, in a season when its traditional to talk about the true meaning of things, its refreshing to watch a movie which reminds us of the true meaning of Westerns: Blood, dead, horse, gun, man, beard.
Fist pump.
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