John Wayne is an icon, but let's be honest about something. The 1969 version of True Grit was a John Wayne movie first and a Western second. When Joel and Ethan Coen announced they were taking another crack at Charles Portis’s 1968 novel, people were skeptical. Why redo a classic? Well, they didn't really "redo" the movie. They went back to the dirt. They went back to the prose. The film True Grit 2010 isn’t a remake; it is a cold, funny, and violent reclamation of a story that was originally much darker than a Hollywood star vehicle.
It’s 1870s Arkansas. Mattie Ross is fourteen. She has the vocabulary of a lawyer and the heart of a bounty hunter. After her father is gunned down by a coward named Tom Chaney, she doesn't cry. She negotiates. She seeks out the "meanest" U.S. Marshal available, a one-eyed drunkard named Rooster Cogburn, played by Jeff Bridges.
What follows is a journey into Indian Territory that feels less like a cinematic adventure and more like a fever dream in the cold woods. Hailee Steinfeld, only thirteen at the time, walked onto a set with Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, and Josh Brolin and basically out-acted all of them. That isn't hyperbole. Without her specific rhythm and iron-willed delivery, the whole thing would have collapsed into a parody of the Old West.
The Script Is A Language Lesson
Most Westerns sound like people trying to sound like cowboys. The Coen brothers realized that the beauty of the source material was the formal, almost Biblical way people spoke back then.
Nobody uses contractions. "I will not" instead of "I won't." "He does not" instead of "He doesn't." It sounds stiff on paper, but in the film True Grit 2010, it creates this incredible, heightened reality. It feels ancient. It makes the humor sharper because everyone is being so incredibly formal while they discuss hanging people or skinning animals.
Roger Deakins, the cinematographer, shot this with a palette of browns, grays, and deep blues. It doesn't look like the bright, Technicolor vistas of the sixties. It looks like a place where you would actually catch pneumonia and die. The lighting in the scene where Mattie first finds Cogburn in the back of a courtroom—smoke drifting through shafts of light—is a masterclass in atmospheric storytelling.
It’s about the grit. Obviously. But it’s also about the cost of vengeance.
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Cogburn vs. Cogburn: Bridges vs. Wayne
You can’t talk about this movie without the Duke. John Wayne won his only Oscar for playing Rooster Cogburn. He was charming. He was a caricature. He was John Wayne.
Jeff Bridges went a different way. His Rooster is a mess. He mumbles. He’s fat. He’s genuinely dangerous and arguably a high-functioning alcoholic who might shoot you just because he’s annoyed. Bridges leans into the "old man" aspect of the character. When he faces down the Lucky Ned Pepper gang at the end of the movie—reins in his teeth, pistols in both hands—it doesn't feel like a heroic stunt. It feels like a desperate, suicidal act of a man who has nothing left to lose but his reputation.
And then there’s LaBoeuf. Matt Damon plays the Texas Ranger as a bit of a buffoon, which is exactly how Mattie sees him. He’s vain. He cares about his spurs. But he’s also competent when it actually counts. The chemistry between the three leads is a constant friction of egos. They don't really like each other. They just happen to have overlapping goals.
Realism Over Romance
The Coens have always been obsessed with the consequences of violence. In the film True Grit 2010, bullets don't just make people fall over. They tear things apart. The scene with the "Bear Man" in the woods or the discovery of the bodies at the dugout cabin—these moments are weird. They’re unsettling.
The West wasn't just a place of outlaws; it was a place of eccentrics.
Think about the character of Tom Chaney. Josh Brolin plays him not as a mastermind, but as a slow-witted, pathetic man who doesn't even understand the magnitude of his crimes. He’s a "nothing" villain. That makes Mattie’s quest even more poignant. She is risking her life and her soul to kill a man who isn't even worth the ammunition.
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Why the Ending Hits Differently
The 1969 film ends on a relatively happy note. Everyone rides off, and it’s a grand old time. The 2010 version sticks to the book. There is a flash-forward. We see Mattie as an adult. She paid a physical price for her revenge. She lost a limb. She never married. She stayed "sharp" and "difficult."
It’s a lonely ending. It suggests that while Mattie got her justice, the West moved on without her. The myth died, and she was left as a relic of a violent era.
Technical Mastery Behind the Scenes
- Production Design: Jess Gonchor recreated Fort Smith not as a dusty street, but as a bustling, muddy hub of commerce and execution.
- Costumes: Mary Zophres made the clothes look heavy. You can almost smell the wool and the sweat.
- Music: Carter Burwell used 19th-century hymns, specifically "Leaning on the Everlasting Arms," as the backbone of the score. It gives the film a mournful, spiritual undertone.
The movie was a massive hit, grossing over $250 million. It’s rare for a Western to do those kinds of numbers nowadays. It resonated because it felt authentic. It didn't treat the audience like they needed a history lesson; it just dropped them into the mud and told them to keep up.
What Most People Get Wrong About True Grit
People often call this a remake. It’s not. If you read the Portis novel, you realize the 1969 film actually stripped away a lot of the book's unique personality to fit John Wayne’s image. The 2010 version is a "faithful adaptation."
There is a big difference.
The Coens kept the dark humor that Portis was famous for. They kept the weirdness. They kept the fact that Mattie is a bit of a religious zealot. Her faith isn't just a background detail; it’s the engine that drives her to believe she has the moral right to hunt a man down.
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Actionable Insights for Cinephiles
If you want to truly appreciate what the Coen brothers did here, you should do a few things.
First, watch the 1969 version and the 2010 version back-to-back. Look at the scene where Mattie crosses the river. In the original, it’s a fun stunt. In the 2010 version, it’s a terrifying moment of a child almost drowning to prove she belongs.
Second, read the book. Charles Portis is one of the most underrated American authors. His dialogue is the reason this movie works.
Finally, pay attention to the silence. Most modern movies are afraid of a quiet scene. The film True Grit 2010 uses the silence of the wilderness to build tension. When a shot finally rings out, it actually means something.
To fully grasp the impact of this film, watch for these specific elements on your next viewing:
- The lack of contractions: Notice how it changes the "speed" of the conversation.
- The lighting in the final night sequence: It was shot to look like a dream, using a "day-for-night" style that feels otherworldly.
- Mattie’s negotiations: Watch her outsmart the horse trader, Colonel Stonehill. It establishes her character better than any action scene ever could.
This movie remains a high-water mark for the Western genre in the 21st century. It proved that you don't need to reinvent the wheel; you just need to respect the dirt and the words that came before you. It is a story about a girl who had "true grit," but it’s also a story about how that grit can harden a person forever.
If you're looking for a film that balances technical perfection with a soul-crushing ending, this is it. Go back and watch it again, but this time, don't look at it as a Western. Look at it as a dark fairy tale about the end of the American frontier.