True Grit

• Fourteen-year-old Mattie Ross's (Hailee Steinfeld) father has been shot in cold blood by the coward Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin), and she is determined to bring him to justice. Enlisting the help of a trigger-happy, drunken U.S. Marshal, Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges), she sets out with him -- over his objections -- to hunt down Chaney. Her father's blood demands that she pursue the criminal into Indian territory and find him before a Texas Ranger named LeBoeuf (Matt Damon) catches him and brings him back to Texas for the murder of another man.


• This was yet another of those movies where I loved the performances but wasn't nearly as thrilled with the movie as a whole. There have been so many of them this year. Jeff Bridges was awesome and the Hailee Steinfeld kid was amazing. It was a little bit rough at first because to be honest, I don't really speak "Western". It was kind of a foreign language for a while there before they got off on their mission. The story dragged at parts and was just kind of there at others, but the performances made me really like the movie. Not sure if that makes sense because I'm kind of baffled by it myself.


• I would definitely recommend people checking this movie out simply for the acting. I don't think it's nearly as good of a complete movie as everyone has made it out to be but the acting was great across the board.