Starring: Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, Hailee Steinfeld, Josh Brolin, Barry Pepper

Directed by: Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

Paramount Pictures

The Official Site of True Grit

True Grit is failure of expectations. Expectations are really a failure of the audience so if True Grit sucked it’s our fault. I think. It’s got to be a little more complicated than that because that thought only barely made sense, so read on because just beneath this nonsense is a theory easier to follow and more coherent thoughts on a pretty damn good movie. Just not the movie sold to us.

Briefly, the obvious on expectations: They ruin everything. Sequels, prequels, adaptations, sexual encounters, your 5th birthday party… the list goes on and on. A film can rarely live up to what we expect it to be so the less we know going in, the better. Even with a largely unknown property like True Grit (Most of us haven’t read the novel that inspired it or Hollywood’s first attempt at adapting it in 1969 with John Wayne in the Rooster Coburn role) we may not know much but we certainly understand the pedigree of the people involved. Names like Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon and Brothers Coen bring with them a certain stink of expectation. Stink is the wrong word but I like the power of the way it sounds. It reads as if it demands an exclamation point. STINK!

Even if you recognize the failings of the cast and crew in the past (the greatest all have a stinker or two in the past) (that was actually the appropriate use of the word “stink� for those keeping track) true expectation of any film lives and dies on the previews. Joseph Gordon-Levitt sold so many tickets for Inception wall-walking up the hotel walls of our dreams. It said nowhere in the advertisements that that’s like 4-minutes of the film. A lot of the complaints around Inception come back to the expectations created after the impressive visual stunts in the trailer turned out to be nothing more than momentary window dressing in the actual film.

Trailers make promises they can’t keep and disappointed audiences are being robbed of a true experience because they get caught in the advertising machine trying to convince them to see a movie they might have liked if they didn’t go in expecting it to be something else.

What made matters worse for True Grit was the first-hand reaction. People that had seen it adored it and people I respect were touting True Grit as the best film of the year! The result, a Star Wars-like hurdle of expectations that could never be overcome short of Rooster saving the day with a dramatic pose and the reveal of a double-bladed light saber.

True Grit promised, simply, a gritty western where a grizzled, one-eyed, master of his craft would unload his six-shooters on the scum of the Earth on behalf of a little girl thirsty for vengeance. Oh and Jason Bourne was going to ride a horse. Sold. Ticket SOLD. Maybe I’ve been watching too much Deadwood or playing too much Red Dead but after the onslaught of exposure and the build up of expectation I had my sights set on a western for our times; Something to set the new standard for great artists telling an epic adventure in the Wild West.

It’s not that. The Coen’s, who accomplished redefining the western and kicking expectations in the balls with No Country for Old Men, make no epic in True Grit. It’s a western that takes its time, develops its characters and conserves its ammunition. It features badass characters mush-mouthing (our heroes suffer from “old� and “bit tongue� - The old west’s leading causes of tragic mush mouth) their way through the film even if they don’t necessarily reveal themselves to be so badass until the last 20 minutes or so of the film. Seriously, the most interesting shootout before the grand finale is between Jeff Bridges and some cornbread. No spoilers on who wins.

I spent a lot of time waiting. Waiting for the violence to heat up. Waiting for the shooting to start. Waiting for the threat to escalate beyond a spanking. My wife turned to me during the film and asked in a whisper, “Are you enjoying it?� to which I replied, “The pacing is set on ‘mosey’.� I was wading through the set-up waiting for the pay off. …As you are now if you’ve fought on this long in my review.

Well here you go. At long last here is the point of the rambling above. While waiting for the movie *I* built up in my own mind I was missing the amazing movie being presented to me.

I was taking these beautiful performances for granted because they weren’t backlit by gunfire. Hailee Steinfeld, who plays Mattie Ross, the young girl out to avenge her father’s death, controls this movie with the kind of power and eloquence that’s well beyond her years. It’s written that way. I mean, Mattie is suppose to be an old soul that is taken for granted at every turn but Steinfeld owns it and whether she’s haggling terms of pony ownership or demanding her way in to the fight, she carries this film ably on her back like a true warrior. The film community is blessed to have her.

I think my first go around with the film I would question some of the choices that the marquee stars made. Damon, Bridges and Josh Brolin (who plays the object of their pursuit) play flawed characters. These are actors less concerned with playing cool cowboys then they are representing real people in a different place and time. When it counts they press the appropriate buttons and at the same time they challenge your expectations of what people were like in that era.

I think a greater example of this is the show-stealer himself, Barry Pepper. Pepper shows up for the last act of the film and takes part in the film’s most satisfying showdown but in his scenes he shows us a filthy outlaw that follows a code of ethics. I feel like this is the sort of thing that doesn’t exist in modern crime thrillers. In the old west a guy would rob you but not shoot you in the back. Things were done on principle, on a mans word. It is a rare treat to meet a gentlemen with rotting teeth and a gun pointed at you. Pepper embraces and escalates this very memorable bit part.

True Grit is a tough as nails western masterpiece but it’s certainly not the one I thought it would be. After coming to the end of the film I knew I’d have to see it again. By that point it had won me over and going back was the only way to really appreciate what I’d missed. It sets a different kind of standard for westerns which is great because the movie I thought they were selling, the movie I thought I wanted to see would’ve probably turned out to be another 310 to Yuma or a classier Quick and the Dead or a Costner-less Open Range. True Grit does its own thing and that’s way better than just fulfilling expectations.

True Grit had an interesting awards season. While earning a lot of critical praise it seemed to turn up a little late for the more high profile stuff. The Globes snubbed it completely. Oscar was good enough to give it some nominations but it was almost as if people had already made up their mind. “Oh cool True Grit is here. Yeah, sorry, it’s either going to be the old regal one or the young digital one. Good to see you though.�

Beyond that the only thing people can seem to agree on is that Damon’s turn as LeBoeuf was unjustly overlooked. I guess so. He makes that tired, “My gun can’t shoot quite that far…� payoff work pretty well.

True Grit is a shorter than average movie, at least compared to what we’ve become used to in these post Return of the King times, and I think that acts a plus towards rewatchability on DVD. A few extra scenes of Bridges shooting down bandits would have made it a sure thing but a healthy supply of extra could be the ultimate deal breaker.

While thinking out this joke my favorite mental picture associated with it wasn’t even the one of Jeff Bridges holding the Tron disk screaming about Iron Man. It was the image of Iron Man peeing on Jeff Bridges’ rug that gave me the giggles. I’m not sure if it was ever addressed in the comics but he must have some sort of internal waste removal system set up right? I mean, what if he really REALLY has to go? Getting the suit on and off realistically is at best a 5-minute process, even with those fancy things from the movie that put and take off the suit for him. It’s just a process. So it must be an internal system that either stores or immediately ejects the piss. What’s the alternative? A pee hole? A little slot that opens up so Iron man can rock a urinal? That seems unlikely…

What I like about the storage unit idea is that if and when he pisses on some guy’s rug he could be using fresh pee or pee he relieved that morning. Something to think about…

This coming weekend I will be attending C2E2 in Chicago where I’ll be doing sketches, selling merch and dishing out high-fives as fast and furiously as I can manage. If you’re in the area stop by what’s sure to be a pretty crazy awesome show and say hello. It’s actually going to be a pretty crazy show with all the celebrities showing up so if you don’t manage to make it back to the Webcomic’s Pavilion I wouldn’t blame you. There’s a high-five and a t-shirt of a penguin holding a grenade waiting for you though.

Because we’ll be at the convention Phil and I put a call out for guest comics for Another Videogame Webcomic. The web comic community is always a funny thing. I’ve done a fair share of guest comics, which I love to do when time permits (check out the one I did last week for In his Likeness) but for one reason or another I always feel funny about asking others to do one for me. I hate putting pressure on people I think. Anyway…

We at first went to our long time convention friend from Dueling Analogs Steve who is a family man and as busy as the rest of the world and felt really bummed about having to pass. (It’s okay buddy. Consider it an open invite!) We put out the call and got a nice response from people like Lee Cherolis, T. Campbell and Jon Scrivens who have been great supporters and friends in the past as well as new faces like John Eton , Jackson Ferrell and the MLWcomics crew who all expressed interest in doing a strip. My movie comic brother Tom also said he might like to but that he doesn’t know much about video games. I’m keeping my fingers crossed he sitting on a classic Pac Man joke. Not Ms. Pac Man though! That bitch is all mine…

Thanks to those guys for showing interest early on and if you’d like to join the fun please feel free to contact either me or Phil at the contact links above. Should be a fun guest run.