True Grit Returns to the Screen

The John Wayne classic True Grit (1969) directed by Henry Hathaway is about to be remade by The Cohen Brothers set for Christmas of this year.

Personally, I'm not exactly sure of the wisdom of the release date. Seems to be all you want to do on the holidays is sit down to a nice, rugged Western movie, right?

The role of Rooster Cogburn, made famous by Wayne, is to be played by the current favorite, Jeff Bridges, who recently won an Oscar for Best Actor, among INNUMERABLE other awards for his role in Crazy Heart (2009).

Joining Rooster on his quest to find the outlaw Ned Pepper (played, coincidentally, by Barry Pepper) are Texas Ranger La Boeuf (Matt Damon) and Mattie Ross (new actress Hailee Steinfeld), who are each after one of Pepper's gang, Tom Cheney (as yet, no word who plays this role) for their own reasons.

I'm on the fence on this one, to tell you the truth. Remakes are nice and all, but damn... there sure do seem to be a lot of them floating around nowdays.

A Restoration of Faith

You know, I've never been a great fan of Tom Cruise. His movies are good, I will admit, but nothing spectacular. Usually, if one of his movies was spectacular, it probably didn't have a great deal to do with him, the writing was good, someone else was better, etc. etc.

Personally, I think the dude's a douchebag.

I mean, all that crap between him and Brooke Sheilds, about how you don't go to a psychotherapist because they're all quacks, and in turn, she's a quack, or whatever the hell all that crap was, not to mention all the Scientology bullshit. Douchetastic.

All that said, I want to see Knight and Day (2010) because he's in it, and he looks funny.

Why the sudden change in perspective? Why do I suddenly enjoy the idea of watching Tom Cruise, specifically, on screen? Find out after the jump.