The Greatest Western of the 2010s Is a Remake That Totally Outshines the Original

Very few remakes are able to stand up to the quality of their predecessors. Even fewer wind up better than the original. When you get filmmakers like Joel and Ethan Coen involved, however, miracles feel a lot more attainable. Given their track record together, it should’ve come as no surprise that they were able to instantly conquer the modern Western back in 2010, crafting a much better version of a John Wayne classic in the process.

True Grit, starring Jeff Bridges (in a role that should have given him back-to-back Oscars), Matt Damon, and Hailee Steinfeld (in her film debut), was an instant Western masterpiece upon its release nearly 16 years ago. From the phenomenal performances turned in by the all-star cast, to the stunning cinematography from Roger Deakins, to the kind of darkly hilarious and simultaneously gut-wrenching dialogue only the Coen Brothers could write, True Grit is an absolute all-timer. It stands easily as the best Western movie of the last 15 years, and could arguably be counted amongst the greatest in the history of the genre.

This ‘True Grit’ Is Better Than the Original

• Image via Paramount Pictures

• Image via Paramount Pictures

• Image via Paramount Pictures

• Image via Paramount Pictures 

• Image via Paramount Pictures

Image via Paramount Pictures

Image via Paramount Pictures

Image via Paramount Pictures

Image via Paramount Pictures 

Image via Paramount Pictures

• Image via Paramount Pictures

• Image via Paramount Pictures

• Image via Paramount Pictures

• Image via Paramount Pictures 

• Image via Paramount Pictures

Image via Paramount Pictures

Image via Paramount Pictures

Image via Paramount Pictures

Image via Paramount Pictures 

Image via Paramount Pictures

Based on the novel by Charles Portis, the original True Grit first hit theaters back in 1969 and was another hit for John Wayne. In fact, this is the film that won Wayne his only Academy Award for acting, though many have argued that it was one of those victories that was more about a full body of work rather than just one performance. While Wayne’s turn as Rooster Cogburn might be looked at as one of his better performances, True Grit is ultimately very forgettable in the grand scheme of his career, as well as in the landscape of the Western genre. The performances surrounding Wayne are tough to watch — Glen Campbell is especially disappointing — and the film doesn’t have the effective pacing of Stagecoach or The Searchers. It’s an average film at best, made memorable because of Wayne’s involvement and the story itself, which can be attributed to the source material.

More than 40 years later, the Coen Brothers found a way to breathe new life into the tale of Rooster Cogburn, finally giving the character the quality film he always deserved but never got. Bridges is remarkable as the drunken Marshal, and he is able to play off a pair of absolutely brilliant actors in Damon and Steinfeld. Their electrifying dynamic paints the tale in an entirely different light, focusing on the melancholy of the West, rather than the rough-and-tumble adventure depicted in the original.

Of course, a lot of that melancholic tone can be attributed to the Coen Brothers, the filmmakers behind Fargo and No Country for Old Men. They have a specific way of viewing the world that really lends itself to the Western genre, capturing the sadness and hopelessness that operate in juxtaposition to joy and humor. There’s a reason they’ve explored the genre in a few different ways over the years, though it’s honestly a little surprising they haven’t made even more Westerns. Hopefully, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs won’t be their last.

Four icons and four completely different ways of walking into trouble.
This is the one you would have been out there, why it fits, and what it would have cost you.

You have never explained yourself and you have never needed to,
because people work out fairly quickly that you are the most capable person in the room
without you ever having to mention it.

• Eastwood built the character out of everything he refused to do, stripping away the
  backstory, the speeches and every bit of reassurance until only the competence was left.
• You keep your own counsel, and while other people occasionally find that unnerving, you
  have never felt any real need to fix it for them.
• The Dollars films work because he genuinely is in it for himself right up until the
  moment he is not, and he never explains that part either.
• You would be gone before anybody got a chance to thank you.

You are the funniest person in most rooms and the most loyal
person in all of them, and you would be genuinely insulted if somebody suggested those two
things were in any tension.

• Doc has no real reason to be in this fight beyond the fact that his friend is in it,
  which is the only reason he has ever needed for anything.
• You lead with wit, and it does a very effective job of hiding how seriously you take the
  handful of people you actually care about.
• Val Kilmer’s performance is the most quoted in the entire genre because the jokes keep
  getting sharper as the situation gets worse.
• You would spend everything you had on this and still describe it as a good week.

You never wanted this job, and you took it anyway because the
alternative was standing there watching somebody less careful do it badly, which is the most
Western reason there has ever been.

• Earp is the reluctant authority figure, a man who came to town specifically to be left
  alone and somehow ended up answerable for all of it.
• You are protective by instinct, so when something goes wrong your first thought is who
  is exposed rather than who is to blame.
• These films understand that keeping order costs far more than breaking it, and that the
  person holding the line almost never gets thanked.
• You would do the whole thing again, and you would complain about it the entire time.

Nobody has ever successfully talked you out of something you had
already decided was right, and a long line of grown adults has found that out the hard way.

• Mattie is the most relentless character in the Western canon and she manages it through
  argument, paperwork and flat refusal rather than a fast draw.
• You have no patience for being managed, so you negotiate, you check the details and you
  turn up exactly when you said you would.
• True Grit is the rare Western where the moral centre is the youngest person on screen
  and every adult around her has to catch up.
• You would get what you came for, and the film is honest about what that takes out of
  you.

One Big Choice Sets the ‘True Grit’ Remake Apart

Of all the great choices made by the Coen Brothers when adapting True Grit, none were more impactful than the decision to not make the movie about Rooster Cogburn. He’s the big character in the story, and he is the person you’ll see the most of throughout any iteration of the film, but the tale has never been his to tell. True Grit belongs to Mattie Ross (Steinfeld), and the remake never once lost sight of that.

Now, putting this kind of heavy exploration of grief and the fragility of life into the hands of an unknown 13-year-old is certainly a choice, but the Coens knew exactly what they had in Hailee Steinfeld. She was more than up to the challenge, delivering one of the best young performances of the 21st century. She was nominated for an Oscar at just 14 for her turn as Mattie Ross, and she easily could’ve walked away as a winner. When it comes to Western movies made after the turn of the millennium, they don’t get much better than True Grit. Even if you weren’t a fan of the original, there’s a great chance you’ll find a lot more to love in this phenomenal adaptation.