Coen Brothers head west with True Grit remake

Nominated for 10 Oscars and, the star attraction at the Berlin Film Festival yesterday, True Grit has plenty to live up to as it opens today in Britain. And while some critics love it, not everyone is convinced that the Coen brothers' 15th film deserves to be their highest grossing movie in the US so far, as it has proved to be.

It is ostensibly a remake of the 1969 John Wayne movie, but the Coens have returned to the original 1968 Charles Portis novel, which set the tone with its opening line:
 
"People do not give it credence that a 14-year-old girl could leave home and go off in the wintertime to avenge her father's blood, but it did not seem so strange then, although I will say it did not happen every day."
 
The 14–year-old is Mattie, played here by newcomer Hailee Steinfeld, who seeks out the half-blind, tough-speaking US marshall Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to help her track down her father's killer, Tom Chaney.
 
Co-director Ethan Coen has said that he wanted to encapsulate the rawness and brutality of the book, which is "funnier, a lot tougher and more violent than the [1969] movie reflects."

It is a Western in the most traditional sense, with all the expected elements of the genre, lovingly captured and preserved.
 
US reviewers were generally impressed when it came out in December. Kenneth Turan, writing in the Los Angeles Times, said: "The Coen brothers clearly find a kindred spirit in Portis. His novel is delivered in all of its savage beauty in this thoroughly entertaining movie."
 
Among the Oscar nominations are best supporting actress for Steinfeld – a "terrific film debut", according to Manohla Dargis of the New York Times - and best actor for Bridges. Other stars include Matt Damon as the unruly Texas Ranger LaBoeuf, and No Country For Old Men's Josh Brolin as the villain Tom Chaney.

WHAT THE UK CRITICS ARE SAYING:
 Xan Brooks, the Guardian: "What's most confounding... is how respectful – how inherently conservative – it is. True Grit is lean, spare and unadorned; modest almost to a fault. It's robustly played and ravishing to look at... But its furniture is almost too comfortable and too lovingly restored." (3/5 stars)
 
Nigel Andrews, the Financial Times: A series of photogravures formed into an elegant, high-toned flip book. We end with a sense of two gifted filmmakers lavishing their gifts on renovation instead of innovation. But the Western is a sacred form. Merely to genuflect before it as filmmakers... will ensure respect and Oscar nominations." (2/5 stars)

Mark Adams, the Daily Mirror: "The Coen brothers' splendidly salty and atmospheric Western is a real cowboy treat, packed with brilliant performances, evocative dialogue and some classic Old West moments." (5/5 stars)

Andrew Lowry, the Daily Telegraph: "We're denied the spare, taut nightmare True Grit could have been. And why they got Jeff Bridges to play every scene like your drunk uncle's John Wayne impression, nobody will ever know. Isn't there something missing? Like, say, something resembling actual human heart?"

Angie Errigo, Empire: "True Grit is majestic, not just the stuff of a classic Western but an epic quest with Biblical and mythical tones. Tough, exciting, funny, gorgeous and bewitchingly acted, this is darn close to perfection." (5/5 stars) ·