Ok, so just I went to see this movie, True Grit. Now I'll try my best to pull my thoughts together into a reasonable text. Here we go..
I didn't really know what to expect from this movie, I hadn't read any reviews, only heard some of my friends saying it's a good movie, and ofcourse the many positive comments about it which you guys posted to my last entry. Thanks.
At first, the beginning of the movie felt a bit patchy. Many short separate scenes, which had so much information to tell in a very short time. Luckily, the movie soon found back on it's track of telling the story. For the rest of the movie, the editing is good, doesn't bother the viewer at all. The camera work is also great, many scenes have very artistic sceneries which are very pleasant to watch.
The movie spends quite alot of time following the main character Mattie's (Hailee Steinfeld) actions in the town, maybe even a little bit too much,. It included many interesting and cleverly written scenes, especially what I found very well thought was the horse trading scene. But there's some unnecessary scenes aswell, mostly just attempts to ease the atmosphere, or scenes practically labelled "look it's a western movie!".
I think the "journey" part is the better half of the movie. I really liked the encounters they had with the strange medicine merchant wearing bearskins, such a shame he only appeared in that one single scene. Also I liked the style how some of the scenes were made, keeping the tension high and viewer on his toes for a long time, suspecting that something is going to happen, but not sure about it. Then BAM, something unexpected totally gets you off guard. (The scene with the two bandits in the small hut).
For the most part, all the acting performances were really good, even Matt Damon did a fine job as "LaBoeuf" the Texas Ranger. But the special mention goes to Jeff Bridges as the marshall Rooster Cogburn, great performance for a well written character. The only less convincing acting was Hailee Steinfeld's performance as Mattie, but considering that she actually is only 14 years old, I'd say her performance is still very good. Finally, what comes to the rest of the cast, the character of the thug gang leader Lucky Ned Pepper (Barry Pepper) was a very interesting one, it was a pity that there were only little introduction and explanation of how the marshall knew him from the past.
Overall, True Grit is a very nice film. It's a nice change compared to typical western films. Even though the plot is fairly simple, the characters of this movie play a major role making it memorable. If you haven't seen this movie, I would definitely recommend watching it.
