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 is one of the rare occasions where I saw the remake of a film before watching the original. It was a bad decision in this case, because the Coen brothers version simply isn't very good; it's a middling film that feels too artificially quirky to work. I'm pleased to report, however, that the John Wayne-starring original is much better, and in fact something of a minor classic.This is a film which plays out in an unhurried style and yet keeps you watching each and every scene to catch the details and nuances. Wayne's Oscar-winning portrayal of Rooster Cogburn is a delight; he's warmer and funnier than I've seen him elsewhere and his larger than life caricature seems to live and breathe off the film. Some have called his acting hammy here, but they miss the point that this is a comedy just as much as it's a western and the humour works very well throughout.Kim Darby is the lynch-pin of the production, playing the educated girl looking for revenge for the death of her father. Darby skirts between being irritating and impressive and does a good job with what would have been a difficult part. Singer Glen Campbell is less impressive, but there are nice if minor parts for the familiar faces of Robert Duvall and Dennis Hopper. The movie is well shot from beginning to end and the action scenes are refreshingly portrayed through mid to long shots allowing the viewer to take in the full picture (nothing worse than too many close ups in action scenes).

The character of Mattie Ross played by Kim Darby is horrendous. Kim looks way too old / too tall to be a teenager, and too old to be wearing a shorter skirt (for the time period). Her hair is too short and the clothes she wears seem so "wrong". It's unbelievable that a female teenager would be so "forward" for the time period. I can't understand why Kim Darby was cast in the role. She ruins the movie. The wardrobe department gets zero stars for how they dressed her.Glen Campbell better suited to singing than acting. The starting song before the movie also doesn't fit the movie either.All in all these two characters/actors were so wrong/didn't work. Made the movie a pain to watch.John Wayne was fine, but in my mind, not worthy of an Oscar for this movie.

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."