1 There is only one True Grit and it stars John Wayne.  I wouldn't dirty my eyes watching such a travesty as a remake.

2 Matt Damon!

3 FYI - That Meg Whitman news? She umployed an undocumented for 9 years.

4 Hollywood is now totally out of ideas.
And hows this, Bridges will be in a remake(this) and a sequel(tron) opening within a week of each other.

5 Coen brothers always make good films, though.

6 I was skeptical; But after seeing the preview I feel a lot better about this.

7 Remaking "True Grit" was  a marvelous idea. 

Also, I think linoleum is a tasty treat, especially the red-colored kind.

8 Jeff Bridges as Rooster Cogburn? BZZZZZZZZZT! I'm sorry, that is WRONG.

9 Hollywood is out of ideas both creatively and politically.

10 It's SO wrong that even dead medieval Italian poets think it's wrong!

11 An invaluable homage to Barack Obama. The little boy with the pigtails is a tough cookie who organizes and leads a passel of criminals against the businesses doin' America wrong.

12

John Wayne's True Grit was practically a life-changing event for me in my early teens.

That said, I am an unrepentant Coen Brothers whore.

I will be there. Matt Damon be damned.

13 Coen Brothers. You like 'em or you don't. The remake don't enter into it.

14 3 FYI - That Meg Whitman news? She umployed an undocumented for 9 years.

Except that Ms. Whitman actually kept the employment ap as well as copies of the maid's SS card and Drivers license.  She's released copies to the media.

15 Is it me or are the Coen Brothers cranking out a movie every two years? The early ones were good but the most recent ones...that's why I'm skeptical.

16

Except that Ms. Whitman actually kept the employment ap as well as copies of the maid's SS card and Drivers license.  She's released copies to the media.

Can't imagine why the LA Times would keep that part out.

17 If anyone can make a remake that improves upon the original, the Coen bros can. And, imho, fwir, true grit wasn't all that anyway. so is this going to be a remake thread?

18 Jeff Bridges trying to fill The Duke's boots?  I smell FAIL.

I really can't think of ANYONE who could do that at the moment, quite frankly.  Maybe Adam Baldwin...  Naaa, not him either.

19 Coen Brothers.
You like 'em or you don't.

*spoiler*

No country for old men. Worst ending ever....

20 It wants "quicktime" to run.

U-Tube version

http://tinyurl.com/246sftd

21 19 Coen Brothers.
You like 'em or you don't.

*spoiler*

No country for old men. Worst ending ever....

This +1

22 No country for old men. Worst ending ever.... Posted by: MikeTheMoose at September 29, 2010 03:14 PM (0q2P7) Is that how the novel ended? Because the ending of the movie just confused us.

23 Mike, It took me several viewings to GET the ending. It's easy to miss. And if you do, you're right, it is a terrible ending. If you don't miss it, it's dark, but actually pretty good.

24 @3, yeah, after the wet showed Meg counterfeit paperwork before the hire... and KCAL9 just now reported Whitman as bringing the situation up to her husband by saying "we have to help (the wet)"... As well as asking the wet's lawyer Gloria AllRed if jerry brown had hired a wet, would we even be here at a news conference today? Will rooster bridges be drinking white russians?

25
o/t:  check out this AP headline:

Note the standard vilification of "corporations".
The republicans have "corporate allies".  In other words; the Republicans stand shoulder to shoulder with private enterprise. 

26 Mike the moose totally disagree. watch it again and think about what the movie is about. it is kind of deep for them but the ending is (imho) the only one possible for that movie (btw, i have not read the book)

27 But what's worse is Lucas is actually going to re-do all 6 Star Wars films in 3D!

MAKE A NEW FUCKING MOVIE GEORGE!!!!!!

28 OK, you guys want me to "spoil" the ending? Because, like I said, it's subtle, but it's really pretty damn good.

29 Who do I have to kill to stop this?

30 John Wayne would have used Matt Damon and Josh Brolin to wipe his ass and his horses' ass, respectively. NO thank you.

31 When will the remake of the remake of True Grit be coming out? That's when i will be interested

32 See, i wouldn't be anti-remake if the remakes were ever any good.  I've yet to see one that isn't a complete mess.  I don't count the newest Star Trek because that wasn't a remake so much as a re-imagining, and it did a very good job at rebooting the franchise.  But remaking True Grit? WHY?  And with MATT DAMON of all people?  Just... No.

33 Posted by: MikeTheMoose at September 29, 2010 03:14 PM (0q2P7)

It should have ended after he walked out of the house, I guess. I can't see a good place to end that movie. Nothing is really resolved.

34 I just watched  "A Serious Man" this weekend..


I didn't get it..


The Coens are hit or miss with me.. 

I might check this out..    If only for the solace that Matt Damon looks like the bad guy and he'll die in the end.

35 The Coen Brothers are amazing.  Every now and then they'll make something awful (Burn After Reading), but No Country For Old Men is one of the best movies of the past 10 years.  If they want to take a shot at a classic, I'll go along for the ride.  FWIW, they supposedly went back to the book the original movie was based on and adapted it from scratch.  I doubt Jeff Bridges will be doing a John Wayne impression.

Also, even though everyone hates re-makes, two of the coolest movies ever are re-makes: The Thing and Scarface.  Most re-makes are terrible cash-grabs, but every now and then there's a good story to tell by going back to a concept that is already out there.

36 moviegique, I'd like to find out but if you don't want to spoil it hit the link and email me.

37

But what's worse is Lucas is actually going to re-do all 6 Star Wars films in 3D!

MAKE A NEW FUCKING MOVIE GEORGE!!!!!!

actually, i would much prefer he stayed away from film making for the rest of his life.

38 Link to the Lucas thing
http://tinyurl.com/2bjdymt

39 Arrggg...What next?  A remake of "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance".  This is just wrong.

40

but No Country For Old Men is one of the best movies of the past 10 years.

Overrated. I still don't get the entire message of the film and i've seen it a few times. i have a couple of ideas, but I'm still not one hundred percent sure what the point was.

 

However i did love Raising Arizona, one of my favorite movies.

41 any other ending would be "vanity"

42 The remake looks to be pretty good, as I'm a Coen bros. fan and a western fan.  That being said, the trailer SUCKED.

43

Coen brothers. Whore.

Cormac McCarthy. Whore.

Coen brothers + Cormac McCarthy = Light-bending whoredom.

These are the true confessions of Bat Chain Puller.

44

I actually don't particularly mind Jeff Bridges saddling up on John Wayne's horse. Nobody could rival The Duke, but Bridges has been damn impressive over the last 10-15 years and could pull off a reasonable alternative.

That said, Matt Damon + Josh Brolin = screw this movie.

45 Looks good but we'll see. BTW, I hate "repops" as well.

46
They need to remake the Spice Girls movie. They are due for a reboot.

47 I hated "No Country for Old Men" and no one can touch this classic from John Wayne. I refuse to watch this.

48 But Mulholland Drive is still the best motion picture in history.

49 I'm putting together a consortium to re-make 'Hondo'

Shia La Beef plays the John Wayne character;  you got a problem with that?

50

Also, I am going to commit a crime here, but I can't stand John Wayne movies. I haven't been able to finish one of them. Maybe it is because I am considerably younger than most people her, but I just don't get it.

51 The Coen Brothers doing a remake?  Why?

When they took an idea out of the movie Sullivan's Travels and spun it into O Brother, Where Art Thou?, that was brilliant.  But why simply remake an existing movie, instead of teasing out a thread and spinning something new and original?

52

 

True Grit II:  The Grittening.

53 Call me when they remake Kim Kardashian's Sex Tape.

54

35

I'm one of the few who find the 80s Scarface ridiculously overrated, so I won't second that example. I will second your point, though, that remakes can be amazing.

Example #1: Maltese Falcon (Bogie's version was the 3rd, I believe)

55 34 I just watched  "A Serious Man" this weekend..

Wasn't that a modern-day incarnation of the book of Job?

actually, i would much prefer he stayed away from film making for the rest of his life.

Agreed.  Lucas has enough money to buy an island somewhere and retire there for the rest of his life.

56 Overrated. I still don't get the entire message of the film and i've seen it a few times

Isn't the message of that movie:  If you find a ton of money in the desert, don't go back later to give some water to the guy who'll probably die anyways?

57 Call me when they remake 'The Karate Kid'.

58

Also, I am going to commit a crime here, but I can't stand John Wayne movies. I haven't been able to finish one of them. Maybe it is because I am considerably younger than most people her, but I just don't get it.

Posted by: Ben at September 29, 2010 03:22 PM (wuv1c)

Dude, you're supposed to WATCH them, not eat the DVDs.

59 What's the difference between Matt Damon & a piece of toast with a smiley face drawn on it?  I would put the toast in my mouth.

60

I hated "No Country for Old Men" and no one can touch this classic from John Wayne. I refuse to watch this.

I wanted to like it. The acting was good. The cinematography was good. The story one its surface was enjoyable yet creepy. But i don't get what point they were trying to make. Anyone care to enlighten me?

Was it that there are bad people in this world and there always have been?

61

Fort Apache, starring Leo DiCaprio as Henry Ford and The Situation as John Wayne.

Coming in 2011.

62 *Fonda

63

Only remake I'd ever want to see is one of Airwolf.

Maybe if Riptide does well?

64 I'm one of the few who find the 80s Scarface ridiculously overrated

Yeah, it's terrible. People only like it cuz of the ending, I think. The rest of it is just awful. I'm not even so sure why the ending is so great, either.

65

 

Shia La Beef plays the John Wayne character;  you got a problem with that?

Then they should just call it Fudgepack Mountain II:  The Beefening.

66 totally disagree. watch it again and think about what the movie is about. it is kind of deep for them but the ending is (imho) the only one possible for that movie (btw, i have not read the book)

Trust me I got it. I know what he was saying, what he thought, why he did what he did. I still hated it. On my system of movie rating (1-10) half the points are scored on the ending. This film had four points prior to ending, and four points after it (5 of 10 being the minimum for worth watching once).

67

MAKE A NEW FUCKING MOVIE GEORGE!!!!!!

actually, i would much prefer he stayed away from film making for the rest of his life.

Amen brother!

68 IF matt damon Dies in the end , I'm O.K. with it ...
.....Plus I'm desperate for new westerns ....

69 "No Country For Old Men" has been re-titled

"Good characters and decent acting in search of a coherent plot"

70 ...watching the moon set over the Rockies right now...

71

60

I think the point was that the world was changing, and people like the Tommy Lee Jones character couldn't keep up.

That and that people don't get happy endings, or even tidy endings. Everyone expected Anton to kill Llewyln, but the Mexicans got him first - offscreen.

72 joncelli, Don't see a link but... *************************************** *****SPOILER!************************** *************************************** Sheriff Bell goes into the room at the end. Shigurh is there. We see him in the reflection of the doorknob. But then, Bell goes in, and Shigurh isn't there. What's happened is that our narrator has become unreliable. In order to save his own life, Bell is lying to us and NOT seeing Shigurh. (Remember, that's the only way to survive an encounter with Shigurh--not to see him.) If you miss that--and I did the first two times through--the rest of the movie doesn't feel resolved. But Shigurh's final murder and Bell's dream suggest, if not redemption for Bell's loss of integrity, at least some sympathy. *************************************** ***** END SPOILER!********************* *************************************** Or, that's my take on it anyway. But then, A Serious Man was my #1 movie last year. And I laughed my ass off during Burn After Reading.

73 Posted by: Ben at September 29, 2010 03:22 PM (wuv1c)

Ace - where's the ban hammer? (kidding, obviously)

74 Was it that there are bad people in this world and there always have been?

Isn't it really a story about regret? Tommy Lee and his father both seemed to regret that they never died in the line of duty. His father for sure; Tommy Lee seemed to be that way at the end too.

75 I'm thinking about remaking 'On Golden Pond'.

76 57 Call me when they remake 'The Karate Kid'.

You mean "The Kung-Fu Kid", (which was what The Karate Kid remake was named in China IIRC)?

77 I would put the toast in my mouth.

Posted by: Joanie (Oven Gloves) at September 29, 2010 03:24 PM (HaYO4)

Where would you put Matt Damon?  

78

Only remake I'd ever want to see is one of Airwolf.

Airwolf once had an episode called "Flight 93 Is Missing".

79

I'm not even so sure why the ending is so great, either.

People like the "going down in a blaze of glory" aspect of it.

Those people should watch White Heat instead.

80 Also, even though everyone hates re-makes, two of the coolest movies ever are re-makes: The Thing and Scarface.  Most re-makes are terrible cash-grabs, but every now and then there's a good story to tell by going back to a concept that is already out there.

Posted by: robviously at September 29, 2010 03:18 PM (N7uu0)

1) The Thing was not a re-make, it was a separate take on the same source material, the short pulp sci-fi story "Who Goes There?"  The 1950 movie barely even nodded to the source material;  Carpenter, on the other hand, took it and ran with it way past the goal line and into gross-out country, far, far away from the original creepiness of the story.

2) The Scarface remake made sense in that it dealt with a new generation of gangsters, an entirely different historical period.

True Grit is a real remake: same story, same characters, same historical period.  What do the Coen brothers get to do differently that gives it a shot at surpassing the original?

81 I like Bridges, and Walter Sobchak changed my life, but the Coen Brothers have ranged from mediocre to downright shitty since Raising Arizona.

I think this movie will be a giant FUCK YOU to John Wayne and western fans.

Hollywooders still have a hardon for John Wayne and try to smear him any way they can. Mostly because he represents something to the peons they hate.

I hope I am wrong and they don't make a travesty.

Also, John Goodman should have been Rooster Cogburn.

82

60

I think the point was that the world was changing, and people like the Tommy Lee Jones character couldn't keep up.

That and that people don't get happy endings, or even tidy endings. Everyone expected Anton to kill Llewyln, but the Mexicans got him first - offscreen.

 

Anton did kill Llewyln. Tommy Lee Jones found the hotel room door lock blown out with compressed air at the end of the film didn't he?

Also, I to your first point, I thought that too the first time i saw the film, but there is a conversation in the film when Tommy Lee Jones goes to see his father or uncle or whoever that older guy is and they talk about the story of a man being shot on his front porch in older times. I don't remember the exact details of the story, but I thought the point of it was to say that this isn't a new evil, it has always existed and will always exist.

83

Also, even though everyone hates re-makes, two of the coolest movies ever are re-makes: The Thing

Totally agree on that one.  Loved it and never miss is it if it's on the tube.

84

"Where would you put Matt Damon?"  

You put him somewhere, I don't want none of that.

85 moviegique: I definitely didn't see that. I rationalized the ending scene (where he relates the dream about his father) as his way of dealing with his shame about not getting Shigurh and then retiring. I didn't know what to make of the scene where he enters the hotel room.

86

Why, oh why can't Hollywood come up with something original and good anymore? The writing is for the most part pure crap.

So we get these pale imitations of the original classics. They almost always worse than the original ("Willy Wonka", anyone? How about "The Wiz?" "Psycho?").

Can the remakes of Gone With The Wind and Citizen Kaine be far behind?

87

"Where would you put Matt Damon?"  

Catcher

88 re-makes?  One plural word:  'AlienS'

"We're all gonna die, man!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

and 'Scarface' was re-made as a comedy, starring Michelle Pfeiffer's almost-visible ta-tas and a Wagnerian ending that was not surreal at all.......not at all

89 I love John Wayne. Loved True Grit. Love the Coen Bros...although I am in the "I-Don't-Get-It" column on No Country. That said, I hate, despise, loathe, am repulsed by and spit o the grave of Matt Damon. The only thing I liked him is was Team America: World Police.

90

Anton did kill Llewyln. Tommy Lee Jones found the hotel room door lock blown out with compressed air at the end of the film didn't he?

That's from when he came back for the money, after the Mexican's killed Moss.

ahh. i see.

91 >>Sheriff Bell goes into the room at the end. Shigurh is there. We see him in the reflection of the doorknob. But then, Bell goes in, and Shigurh isn't there.

>>What's happened is that our narrator has become unreliable.

I thought he was behind the door.

92
Hollywood remakes - *groan*

93 I plan on seeing this.

As far as everyone busting on Matt Damon, Okay I can understand that.

But, I thought the same thing when I seen Donnie Wahlberg playing Carwood Lipton in BoB, but damn if didn't do a fine job there.

94 NCFOM- good grief, has no one here but me read the damn book?

95 I'm ambivalent. I like the way the Coens handle good dialog, I like Bridges, I like casting a 13 year old girl as a 13 year old girl. But Damon as Laboeuf? I'd rather see Glenn Campbell again, even mugshot-drunktank GC. Brolin is a charisma black hole and there is no Strother Martin. It's all very meh, and likely to be mediocre in execution. And I say this as one of about 5 people who actually liked the Ladykillers remake.

96 Anton did kill Llewyln. Tommy Lee Jones found the hotel room door lock blown out with compressed air at the end of the film didn't he?

I always thought that was after the mexicans killed Llewlyn. the lock was still on the door when they first found the scene. Later, when Jones went back the lock was punched. That was when Anton arrived.

I thought Anton was gonna kill Jones, but that never panned out.

97

50 bucks says they remake the film Legend in the next 5 years

98 I love the Coen Bros. but having both Matt Damon and Josh Brolin, two arch-liberal douchers in it, leaves me shaking my head. I want to see this movie. I don't want to see them part of it.

99 joncelli-- It's all in those two moments: Tommy Lee looking at the doorknob and seeing Javier Bardem's reflection. Then he goes in and doesn't see anything. Because to see Sigurh is to die. He "didn't see evil" in order to save his own life. Very dark, indeed. That said, I've only read one McCarthy book, "The Road", and thought it was pointless and bleak. So maybe that's what the guy does.

100

I thought Anton was gonna kill Jones, but that never panned out.

yeah you're right, haven't seen it in a bit

the more i think about that film the less i like it.

it didn't seem to have any point.

101 60

I hated "No Country for Old Men" and no one can touch this classic from John Wayne. I refuse to watch this.

I wanted to like it. The acting was good. The cinematography was good. The story one its surface was enjoyable yet creepy. But i don't get what point they were trying to make. Anyone care to enlighten me?

Was it that there are bad people in this world and there always have been?

Posted by: Ben at September 29, 2010 03:24 PM (wuv1c)

Yeah, that's part of it.  The Tommy Lee Jones part is about discovering that you're too old to confront the evil in the world anymore -- either he's not what he used to be, or the world is spinning out of control and he can't keep up.  The main moral of the story is that "There are no clean getaways."  Llewellyn tries to get ahead in life the wrong way and it brings death (personified by Anton Chigurth) to himself and his wife. 

It's also amazingly well-made.  The cinematography in Texas is fantastic, and if you watch it again you'll notice the three main characters (Llewellyn, Chigurth, and TLJ) are never in the same shot together even as they spend the whole movie on a collision course. 

102 Hey, the girl from Napolean Dynamite. I didn't give a shit what had happened to her. Glad she's still working.

103
 The Rooster does not abide.

104 That and that people don't get happy endings, or even tidy endings

I always expect a happy ending and for the masseuse to tidy up on her way out.

Release the second shackra

105 >>I thought he was behind the door. He was. Bell lies to us and says he wasn't so he can live. Look at the way TLJ sits on that bed. Evil is there, and he's ignoring it rather than die.

106 NCFOM was really not that different from Fargo or Blood Simple. I see the three of them as a trilogy. They all have a good v evil, creepiness, and a dissatisfying ending (ie, non traditional hollywood everything is resolved and the good guy wins ending) So why are so many people down on NCFOM?

107

Why remake a movie when the original was just right?

I get it if technology can improve fight scenes or other crap but this is character driven and doesn't need improvement with the sets or "action" shots.

I agree with Toby, Kim Darby was perfect.

108 I thought the point of it was to say that this isn't a new evil, it has always existed and will always exist.

Posted by: Ben at September 29, 2010 03:29 PM (wuv1c)

It was his father, who retired as sheriff; the guy killed on the porch by Injuns was their father / grandfather, who was also sheriff

Some things change; some things don't.  I didn't need that movie to enlighten me

I liked the movie while being very conscious of its flaws ( sorta like Life Itself )

109 Anyone care to enlighten me?

I'll give it a shot.

MAJOR SPOILER ALERT DO NOT READ!!!!

No country for old men resolves essentially when Josh is suddenly killed without warning or explanation. This was I think the Coen's way of refocusing us on the fact that the "story" was not about Jasj and his attempt to escape with the money but in aging Bell's attempt to capture a dangerous killer. He has the opportunity to do so in the hotel room and passes it up. This end is the point where Bell realizes that he cannot do so and preserve his own life due to being outmatched by such a violent young capable killer; feeling the ravages of time and the loss of his youthful edge he concludes that serving justice in such a wild land is a game for younger men, so he gives up and chooses retirement. It is understood that the antagonist Chigurh would likely continue his habit of killing until captured by someone else. The last scene is him explaining in an abstract manner the fact that he was giving up the part of himself that was the lawman, to become just a man.

/Spoiler

110 The Duke or the Dude?  WTF?

111

nine coconuts,

i liked the ending to fargo. Anything that ends with people getting stuffed into a wood chipper is a ok in my book.

112 It's obvious to the well-educated who populate the Eastern Seaboard that Charles Portis--the Arkansas novelist who penned the book Henry Hathaway adapted to film--meant to title his novel "True Grist." Because Rooster Cogburn is old and experienced he is like grain already ground down by life's hardships. Sadly, Portis is a only a backwards hillbilly ruben from the cousin-marrying corner of the country. If only everyone were half the wordsmith I am, the world might be a more beknighted place.

113
I really can't think of ANYONE who could do that at the moment, quite frankly.  Maybe Adam Baldwin...  Naaa, not him either.

You really should  be more respectful of a man who names his rifle Vera.

;">Y'all see the man hanging out of the spaceship with the really big gun? I'm not saying y'all weren't easy to find. But it was kinda out of our way, and he didn't want to come in the first place. Man's lookin' to kill some folk. So really, it's his will y'all should worry about thwarting.

114

Can the remakes of Gone With The Wind and Citizen Kaine be far behind?

GWTW wil never be remade.  Simply cannot come close to the original.  Still stands up today imho.  Vivien Liegh, Clark Cable?? No fucking way anything out of Hollywierd today can come close to the charisma those two had.

115 This horse really ties this barn together

116 Considering it's from the Coen Brothers, I'd at least look into it. But the useless sucker of Howard Zinn's decomposing cocklet, Matt Damon, means now way in hell. Fuck him.

117

thanks for everyone helping enlighten me on NCFOM.

we need more movie discussion threads.

118 True Grits. It's what's for breakfast.

119 Anything that ends with people getting stuffed into a wood chipper is a ok in my book.

I loved those endings too!

120 Killing Carla Jean was gratuitous.

Posted by: toby928™ at September 29, 2010 03:35 PM (S5YRY)

True, but it was 'off screen'; a lotta Stuff in that movie was Off Screen.  C McC's books are unreadable ( for me ) because so much is going on but not mentioned.

At the end, TLJ knows the killer is there, but does not seek Vengeance or Justice. Maybe the Worse Movie Ending Evah

121 I want a remake of Jane Ayer.  Best movie ever.  Or Fame.

122

How about instead of making remakes, they finish of the Killer Angels trilogy.

I loved Gettysburg and enjoyed Gods and Generals. Are they ever going to make the third one?

123 I like a lot of the Coen's movies but A Serious Man was terrible.

124 Matt Dies at the End!!!! remaking True Grit with MattDamon is just really pissing on all our faces. It's beyond belief. I used to love the Coen Bros but AM DONE meanwhile - the guy who made Phantasm is making the John Dies at the End movie - cannot wait! thank gott for schlocky horror

125

Can the remakes of Gone With The Wind and Citizen Kaine be far behind?

Posted by: Log Cabin at September 29, 2010 03:31 PM (slOv

I shudder to think what a remake of GWTW would look like in today's PC environment. 

What would they do to make "I don't give a damn" as controversial today as it was in 1939? Probably change it to the f word. 

Mamie would be recast as an illegal.

126 Although I mostly agree on the remake hatred, there were a few good ones. Chicago actually grew with each remake. (OK, i'm guessing most of you hate Chicago) Body Heat was great, but still not as good as the original (Double Indemnity) My biggest fear with modern remakes is that they will turn an American Icon into liberal pap. Second fear is that it will suck (Ocean's 11) but totally overshadow the original Either way i will have to spend hours explaining this to people when they tell what a great movie they just saw.

127 56 Isn't the message of that movie: If you find a ton of money in the desert, don't go back later to give some water to the guy who'll probably die anyways? Oh...yeah...guess that makes as much sense as any other message from No Country.

128 Ace links to the dark side, Apple! 

A trailer from I tunes? 

Do I have to run a scan to get all their shit off my computer now?

129 Posted by: MikeTheMoose at September 29, 2010 03:37 PM (0q2P7)

Yeah, you nailed it

"Fargo" -- one of the Best Movie Endings Evah

130

I remember my parents having a long discussion about whether they could go see the movie and take me. I was like 5? They were worried about language.

Jeff Bridges??? in a Wayne roll? I didn't know they made movies without John Wayne for most of my childhood.

Bleh

131 They got anyone lined up to play the horse yet?

132 With the exception of the ending (I won't spoil it for the few who'll treat themselves to it), the John Wayne True Grit was quite loyal to the book, with whole chunks of dialogue translating to the screen quite nicely (and both Wayne's and Kim Darby's delivery of the lines was exceptional); even Glenn Campbell looked good as an actor (and that, my friends, is real movie magic). In fact, the film showed genius in casting and direction. The movie itself is iconic.

Much as I love the Coen brothers, I don't see them doing the novel or the original movie justice. There's a reason nobody's done a serious remake of Casablanca.

133 120

Can the remakes of Gone With The Wind and Citizen Kaine be far behind?

I was thinking a remake of Casablanca.  This time we'd get to see Richard Blaine fuck her for the plane tickets.

134 Chicago actually grew with each remake. (OK, i'm guessing most of you hate Chicago)

I bought Chicago because I like CZJ and I don't have many musicals and I thought that would be a good one.

I should have rented it first. It is the prime suck-a-tude.

135 The best candidates for remakes are movies based on good raw material, with some classic elements onscreen and some serious miscues. You may not be able to duplicate the classic stuff but there's still potential for a better overall picture.

No one can beat John Wayne as Rooster Cogburn. But Kim Darby can be improved upon, and Glen Campbell practically ruins the original. He positively stinks up the screen. The original dialog was intentionally stilted and antique. I'd like to hear a Coen brothers rewrite. 

From Crazy Heart, you can see how Jeff Bridges might be a serviceable Rooster, though the original version required a hero of epic stature. Possibly this version is centered more on the kid, as the novel was. If so, it will work much better as drama. It's a good sign that they chose a younger heroine.

The Coens are brilliant at creating a specific sense of time and place, and for balancing dry humor with offbeat characters and violent behavior. This is good material for them. I doubt they would have chosen to remake True Grit if they didn't have a clear strategy for making it better.


 

136 126 Killing Carla Jean was gratuitous.

Posted by: toby928™ at September 29, 2010 03:35 PM (S5YRY)

True, but it was 'off screen'; a lotta Stuff in that movie was Off Screen.  C McC's books are unreadable ( for me ) because so much is going on but not mentioned.

At the end, TLJ knows the killer is there, but does not seek Vengeance or Justice. Maybe the Worse Movie Ending Evah

Posted by: SantaRosaStan at September 29, 2010 03:40 PM (dPcmp)

It's easy to "seek Vengeance or Justice" when you aren't the one who actually has to confront a monster like Anton Chigurth.  That's the whole point.  Tommy Lee Jones (Sheriff Bell) is completely outmatched and he knows it.  He's done.  He's an old man and the world has deteriorated to the point where he can't keep up.  He can either confront Chigurth and die, or go home to his wife.  He chooses the latter.

137 That said, I've only read one McCarthy book, "The Road", and thought it was pointless and bleak. So maybe that's what the guy does. Posted by: moviegique

McCarthy is a misanthrope who writes in sheer spite of readers.

138 #128  I loved Gettysburg and enjoyed Gods and Generals. Are they ever going to make the third one?

Probably not, since Gods and Generals bombed at the box office.  My Google-Fu is yielding nothing on any thing about a potential The Last Full Measure movie.

139

Hollywood kills me. There are so many subject they could make movies about. There is an absolute paucity of films set during World War One or concerning the issues surrounding it. I would think that would make for a great period piece.

140 With the cost of a movie roughly the same as a hooker and a trip to the clinic for a shot, I'd rather not go to the movies and see something that makes me depressed.

I can read all about evil and loss and grief and terror in the morning blogs.  Or  I can call my Mom on the phone and have her tell me all about her last doctor appointment.

This gritty dark shadowy gothic reboot silliness is too emo for me. When I go to a western I want to feel good.  Good guy kicks the shit out of the bad guy.

Keep this Euro-art angst trash in the little sticky-seated theaters in the "arts" district.

Also Matt Damon is a waste of the public oxygen.

141 Not even gonna watch the trailer, based upon its pedigree.

The only thing this movie will accomplish is to provide more evidence of how far Hollywood has fallen. Jeff Bridges is one of our few decent remaining actors, and even he couldn't carry John Wayne's horse's feed bag.

I wonder whether anyone will ever have the cojones to try a remake of The Searchers or She Wore A Yellow Ribbon?

142 The moral of "No Country for Old Men" is that there are no morals. The bad guy wins every once in a while.

143 MiketheMoose says:
He has the opportunity to do so in the hotel room and passes it up.

This scene still gives me goosebumps when I watch this movie.  The realization dawns on you that the world is actually NOT full of "John McClanes" and forces the viewer to really see how ridiculous Hollywood Cops really are.

Internally, I watch that scene and I realize that I probably would have done the same.  It forces you to look into the void.

144 Damon is gonna be the Marshall (who does die YESSS!) and Brolin is the bad guy.

145

 #128  I loved Gettysburg and enjoyed Gods and Generals. Are they ever going to make the third one?

Probably not, since Gods and Generals bombed at the box office.  My Google-Fu is yielding nothing on any thing about a potential The Last Full Measure movie.

yeah, that's a shame.

146 Clint Eastwood put Matt Damon in his new movie...don't these people know that he's a CANCER and a BUST at the boxoffice?  I mean, you can only do so many anti-American / anti-military movies before people just don't want to see your puss anymore.

Damon wore out his welcome a long time ago.

147

If you're going to remake a picture, remake it it exactly like the first version, frame for frame.  Only then can you say that you've paid appropriate respect to the original.

My philosophy is box office dynamite, too.

148

Robert Duvall could have played Rooster in this one. He was, of course, in the original.

But Jeff Bridges? No.

And I simply cannot separate my politics from my opinion of Matt Damon. He's a Chomskyite and that's just too much for me.

 

149 Matt Damon dying makes it almost worth watching.  But not watching is worth more.

150 Am I the only one that liked Damon in Departed? His politics aside, of course

151 145 #128  I loved Gettysburg and enjoyed Gods and Generals. Are they ever going to make the third one?

Probably not, since Gods and Generals bombed at the box office.  My Google-Fu is yielding nothing on any thing about a potential The Last Full Measure movie.

Posted by: Kratos (Ghost of Sparta) at September 29, 2010 03:46 PM (9hSKh)

I'm surprised they made it at all. It is all about "religion" and it is not portrayed as "evil".

152

Am I the only one that liked Damon in Departed?

His politics aside, of course

One of the worst movies ever made.

EVER.

153
Fuck it, Rooster, let's go bowling.

154

I can read all about evil and loss and grief and terror in the morning blogs.  Or  I can call my Mom on the phone and have her tell me all about her last doctor appointment.

Oh God, you too? 

155

Vic,

I think Ted Turner funded the entire movie didn't he? He was in the movie and had a few lines. It was the scene where the southern officers were watching a performance of Bonnie Blue Flag

156

It's easy to "seek Vengeance or Justice" when you aren't the one who actually has to confront a monster like Anton Chigurth.  That's the whole point.  Tommy Lee Jones (Sheriff Bell) is completely outmatched and he knows it.  He's done.  He's an old man and the world has deteriorated to the point where he can't keep up.  He can either confront Chigurth and die, or go home to his wife.  He chooses the latter.

Posted by: robviously at September 29, 2010 03:45 PM (N7uu0)

I agree, but the ending is Massive Downer to a movie which kept taking shots at being Profound ( and failing ).  The killer is a new Modern Evil; or is it the Mexican Mafia?  Both?  Everything?

Signs & Wonders...............

As someone noted above, C McC likes to punish his readers; the movie punished the audience

157 Posted by: MikeTheMoose at September 29, 2010 03:37 PM (0q2P7)



Interesting, i never really was sure what to make of that movie, but that soynds plausible.

158 Re The Maltese Falcon: certainly the Bogie version is the best. It's a classic. But don't sell the 1931 version short. It's worth watching on its own merits.

159

One of the worst movies ever made.

Are you serious???

I have the attention span of a flea. And that movie, clocking in at what, over 2 1/2 hours absolutely flew by. I was rivted by it and hooked from the first minutes.

160 160 Am I the only one that liked Damon in Departed?


Yes.

161 Ben, wow, i really liked The Departed. (another remake btw)

162 The dude from Hurt Locker would have made a good Lucky Ned Pepper.

163 If shit wore shoes and stepped on The Departed, it would throw it's shoes away.

164

One of the worst movies ever made.

EVER.

Posted by: Ben at September 29, 2010 03:50 PM (wuv1c)

Can't agree:  "The Departed" was a linked series of great mini-movies which didn't quite connect, but it was entertaining and interesting.  Good, not great, could have been better...........

Compared to what Hollywood cranks out these days, it was better than most

165

Read to book, LOVED the Duke's movie. That being said - Jeff Bridges is the only actor alive today who could hope to play the part per the book, Glen Campbell was WOODEN as the Texas Ranger - Matt Damon couldn't be worse and I expect the writing to be tighter than the original - and YES he dies at the end. Brolin as Ned Pepper? Oy - I wouldn't want to try to fill Robert Duvall's shoes in anything he has ever done. Just DON'T. And Brolin is too pretty.

Will I be there? You betcha!

And I bloody well MISS The Duke!

166 The Cowboys is the western I'd put in a time capsule for the future.

167

Internally, I watch that scene and I realize that I probably would have done the same.  It forces you to look into the void.

 

Ah!  The void!

168

Did everybody like The Maltese Falcon with Humphrey Bogart? It was a remake of 

_{(wait for it)}

The Maltese Falcon

Well yeah, just because something's a remake doesn't automatically make it shite.  For example, I liked the Ford remake of Sabrina much more than the Bogart original, and the Heston version of The Ten Commandments (deMille's second take on it) infinitely more than the 20's B/W version.  But it seems like remakes/sequels are all that's out there, and what's more, it's remakes which are entirely unnecessary-- The Karate Kid, srsly?  Are there honestly no other screenplays out there?

If we had a moratorium on all remakes, sequels, prequels, expanded TV episodes, and series add-ons, theaters would be showing those stupid pre-movie trivia slide shows on 9 screens and nothing else. 

But I am hugely looking forward to Secretariat, which opens next week, I think.

169

I loved The Departed and liked Damon in it, but he that's probably because he wasn't really acting: he is a two-faced sniveling bitch in real life.

DiCaprio was good, Damon was good, the supporting guys were great (Sheen, Walhberg, Baldwin, the thugs in Costello's gang).

The only one I hated was Jack. He absolutely ruined nearly every scene he was in.

170

One of the worst movies ever made.

Are you serious???

I have the attention span of a flea. And that movie, clocking in at what, over 2 1/2 hours absolutely flew by. I was rivted by it and hooked from the first minutes.

YES. I am so serious.

If you want to say it is entertaining. Fine, so was Oceans11, but they were both terrible movies.

I honestly believe Scorsesie(spelling?) was told that they Academy would give him an Oscar on his next film, so he threw together a garbage script, tossed in some movie stars, and set it in boston and presto blammo, Oscar Award.

Jack Nicholson, who i like, overacted in that film so much that scenes with him were unwatchable.

The entire premise of the film was ridiculous.

The 10-15 homicides in the last 5 minutes was just for shock value. It was like a bloody version of a M.Night Shamalyn twist.

And Boston, dear god, am I the only person getting sick of films set in Boston?

I could go on, but i want the 2 1/2 hours of my life back that i wasted watching that film.

171 Well it looks great but I can't imagine a single reason to remake this classic movie, did it have any flaws at all?

172

Jeff Bridges is the only actor alive today who could hope to play the part per the book

Duvall could pull it off.

 

173 Cape Fear yo

174 Yeah, if I hear about a Searchers remake, I'll be on the next plane to California to whip someone's ass.

175

Damon is toxic. He ruined Saving Private Ryan for me and I won't watch anything that he's in.

Actually anything that comes out of Hollywood nowadays is a piece of shit so, no thanks.

176 And so it begins.

177 Btw, that illegal alien who used to work for Whitman will be deported now, right Right?

178 NCFOM is one of my favorite movies that I don't watch a lot.

3 of the best scenes evah are in this movie.

This scene alone is worth the price of admission.

179

Damon is toxic. He ruined Saving Private Ryan for me and I won't watch anything that he's in.

it was a pretty bad movie to begin with. It's only saving grace were the actual battle scenes.

It's moral relativism was too much to bear.

180 76 I'm thinking about remaking 'On Golden Pond'. Posted by: Michael Bay at September 29, 2010 03:27 PM (0BXUB) I prefer the porn version, ON GOLDEN BLONDE, myself.

181

Very anti-remake, and not big on Wayne either.

Scarface is so well-liked due to it's over-the-topness (to coin a phrase). It's a Pacino hamfest, Pfeiffer is very hot in the movie, and I know some people who tear up at the sight of all that coke on the desks and tables.It's hardly a cinegraphic masterpice, but it is fun.

182 jewells , I think it was you that had relatives with mortgage problems ? This could have some impact Link , to Zero Hedge , check the top two stories .

183 John Goodman would have made a better Rooster. He has the booming voice, he's fat, already wore an eye patch in O Brother Where Art Thou, and plays a damn fine drunk.

Goodman as Rooster, Bridges as La Beef, and Matt Damon as a commie male prostitute killed in the first scene.

But the stopped asking my opinion long ago.

184

No question about it.  The worst critically acclaimed movie ever made was

There Will Be Blood. 

 

i agree and disagree.

The first hour of that film is one of the best movies i've ever seen. It captured the early america captains of industry and how they built themselves up from nothing, but the second half of the film goes off the rails and ruins it.

185 Cape Fear yo

Posted by: Knemon at September 29, 2010 03:57 PM (PWovt)

The re-make shat all over the original.  Robert Mitchum made DeNiro look ridiculous. 

Of course having DeNiro as a Jesus-freaked redneck was Hollywood Bullshit, but the original was twenty times better than that sad re-make.

186 MAKE A NEW FUCKING MOVIE GEORGE!!!!!!

Be careful what you wish for.  The last time that happened, we got JarJar Binks and "I hate sand" as a pickup line.

187 193

No question about it.  The worst critically acclaimed movie ever made was

There Will Be Blood. 

I drink your milkshake!

188 I love John Wayne movies.  Love John Wayne.  John Wayne is an icon, but he was a terrible actor - he didn't perform characters, he performed the same role in every movie - John Wayne.  He was to acting what Louis L'Amour was to writing.

True Grit wasn't even in the top five of John Wayne movies.  Casting Glen Campbell is like casting a dumber version of Barney Rubble.  Trailer looks pretty good.

189 I want them to make a remake of "The Sixth Sense" because my brother told about the ending and ruined the surprise for me.

Posted by: Matt Damon at September 29, 2010 03:48 PM (GUQlk)

I SERIOUSLY want to remake Signs and give it an ending that's a real twist, not a weak rip-off of Day of the Triffids.

190

No question about it.  The worst critically acclaimed movie ever made was

There Will Be Blood. 

Ever seen Moonstruck?

191 Filly, when most people criticize remakes, they are talking about remakes of Classic, Iconic, Successful movies. So yeah, a lot of movies are remade because the first time they didn't get it right or didn't get the attention. Or they want to update the script of effects, or just take another shot at the story. That is fine by me.

192 168  It's easy to "seek Vengeance or Justice" when you aren't the one who actually has to confront a monster like Anton Chigurth.  That's the whole point.  Tommy Lee Jones (Sheriff Bell) is completely outmatched and he knows it.  He's done.  He's an old man and the world has deteriorated to the point where he can't keep up.  He can either confront Chigurth and die, or go home to his wife.  He chooses the latter.

Posted by: robviously at September 29, 2010 03:45 PM (N7uu0)

I agree, but the ending is Massive Downer to a movie which kept taking shots at being Profound ( and failing ).  The killer is a new Modern Evil; or is it the Mexican Mafia?  Both?  Everything?

Signs & Wonders...............

As someone noted above, C McC likes to punish his readers; the movie punished the audience

Posted by: SantaRosaStan at September 29, 2010 03:51 PM (dPcmp)

What shots at "being profound" are you referring to?  It's mostly a chase movie with two themes: 1. you can't get ahead in life by doing the wrong things, and 2. everyone has their time on earth to confront evil and it doesn't last forever.  That's about it.

As for it being a "Massive Downer" -- yep, that's about it.  But there's no dramatic tension if you know you're getting a happy ending.  There was no way that story was going to have a happy ending either; it definitely wasn't building towards one over the first two hours.

193

No question about it.  The worst critically acclaimed movie ever made was

There Will Be Blood. 

Ever seen Moonstruck?

Pretty Women was pretty f'ing bad too.

194 The Michael Bay version of 'On Golden Pond' sounds like the best idea yet.

195 Costner could have done La Beef.

196

It's moral relativism was too much to bear.

Posted by: Ben at September 29, 2010 03:59 PM (wuv1c)

That element escaped me, I guess. I was trying not to be pissed off while I watched it.

197 193....ah yes. I literally fell asleep on There Will Be Blood both times I tried to watch it. I did manage to see the "I drink your milkshake" part, as well as the very end of the movie. Daniel Day-Lewis is great but the movie sucked.

198 205 193

No question about it.  The worst critically acclaimed movie ever made was

There Will Be Blood. 

I drink your milkshake!

Posted by: Daniel Plainview at September 29, 2010 04:01 PM (awin)

My vote goes to American Beauty.  Total waste of time and boring as all hell.  They really made an entire movie about how awful life in the suburbs is?  And it won Oscars for that?

199

Of course having DeNiro as a Jesus-freaked redneck was Hollywood Bullshit, but the original was twenty times better than that sad re-make.

Posted by: SantaRosaStan at September 29, 2010 04:00 PM (dPcmp)

Mitchum's portrayal was of a kind of evil that was so relentless and nefarious that you were terrified to the bone.  De Niro was a fucking cariacature.

And when Gregory Peck told Mitchum he was going to live in that cage a long, long time, that was sweeeeeeet!

200 146 Hollywood kills me. There are so many subject they could make movies about. There is an absolute paucity of films set during World War One or concerning the issues surrounding it. I would think that would make for a great period piece. Posted by: Ben at September 29, 2010 03:46 PM (wuv1c) It won't fly. Unless you get a star attached to it. The wizards of smart who run the studios are not showmen. They are MBA's with zero "nose" for show biz. They read statistics which tell them that the movie ticket buyers are all male between the ages of 11 and 24. Big explosions and karate with the occasional shot of poozle. THAT'S ENTERTAINMENT!

201

Scarface as a movie was okay but it does have one of my top ten movie scenes in it.

That would be the shower torture scene. 

i think that movie is popular because of never before seen violence and a few good lines. otherwise its a wash.

202 187

Jeff Bridges is the only actor alive today who could hope to play the part per the book

Duvall could pull it off.

I pondered that, and realized Duvall isn't bat-shit crazy enough. Bridges sure is.

203 Glen Campbell was drunk and stoned out of his gourd on pills during "True Grit" and fell apart after the movie.  He needed to be propped up during his scenes and was only picked because of............"Wichita Lineman"

are you there on the line.......................?

Marion Morrison ( aka John Wayne ) parodied himself in that movie, so remaking it with someone else is sorta Pointless.  There are no Movie Heroes, so what is there to parody?

204 I thought Deep Blue Sea was a remake that improved upon Jaws.

205 I was disappointed in There Will Be Blood when I 1st saw it but it has grown on me.

206 My vote goes to American Beauty.  Total waste of time and boring as all hell.  They really made an entire movie about how awful life in the suburbs is?  And it won Oscars for that?

Posted by: robviously at September 29, 2010 04:03 PM (N7uu0)

What I learned from American Beauty is that gay people are psychos who will go on shooting rampages in your quiet suburban neighborhood.  Wasn't that the intended message?

207

You're criticizing Moonstruck now??

SNAP OUT OF IT!!!

208 Filly,
when most people criticize remakes, they are talking about remakes of Classic, Iconic, Successful movies.

So yeah, a lot of movies are remade because the first time they didn't get it right or didn't get the attention.

Or they want to update the script of effects, or just take another shot at the story. That is fine by me.

Yeah, I would put Sabrina and 10 Commandments in that category, which is why they didn't bother me-- in fact, I liked 'em better.  Shit like another Charlie's Angels and Han shooting first, though?  DO NOT WANT. 

209

My vote goes to American Beauty.  Total waste of time and boring as all hell.  They really made an entire movie about how awful life in the suburbs is?  And it won Oscars for that?

ahh good submission. That movie was unbearable. I remember seeing it in highschool and having to pretend to like it cause everyone else thought it was deep and interesting.

It had a good original soundtrack, otherwise it was your average hollywood tripe.

Suburbs=Seventh Circle of Hell

A Job that isn't glamorous=torture

Ex-Marine= nazi homosexual bigot

210

Speaking of Academy atrocities AND Scorcese:

Dances with Wolves over Goodfellas.

I don't think anything else needs to be said.

211 American Beauty really is one of the worst movies of all time, and i'd put Pleasantville right up there with it. Both were nothing more than vehicles for liberals to attack a way of life they detested.

212 138 They got anyone lined up to play the horse yet? Posted by: Sarah Jessica Parker at September 29, 2010 03:44 PM (QKKT0) Thread winner!

213 Internally, I watch that scene and I realize that I probably would have done the same.  It forces you to look into the void.

SPOILER No Country For Old Men

All that is needed for bad men to prevail is for good men to do nothing. He went so far, to not take the last step. Standing there knowing, if I didn't try and face him, others, probably innocents would die, I hope that I would face him. I understand he was human....But....At least right now I feel that moving on with the baggage of knowing I failed to stand for what was right when office, position, trust of my countrymen, and God demanded it, lest others fall, I don't think I could live with that, and if I could it would haunt me each day I drew breath thereafter.

So you have an epiphany, your getting to old for this sh*t. Great we all have that at some point. Finish up what you are doing, then retire and pass the torch to someone else. Don't pass up the opportunity to do what is desperately needed just because you got the idea in your head it's time to retire. What if an aging infantry sergeant just walks off during a fire fight because suddenly he realized being in the infantry is a young mans game? He knew who he was after, he knew the dangers of what he was tracking, that was his opportunity to throw in the towel and send somebody younger; but no, he continued the chase until faced with the inevitable confrontation that could have ended the evil, and he, at that point, decided he wasn't up to fulfilling the duties of his office and walks away. I'm sorry I can't abide that. Contrast the ending of 3:10 to Yuma.

/SPOILER

214

thought Deep Blue Sea was a remake that improved upon Jaws.

my hat is like a sharks fin.

someone explain that to me. that movie has resulting in the most puzzling rap lyric in human history.

215 150 The moral of "No Country for Old Men" is that there are no morals. The bad guy wins every once in a while.

Posted by: rawmuse at September 29, 2010 03:47 PM (yhrH5)

Er, I would say it's the exact opposite of that.  There is such a thing as right and wrong and Llewellyn destroys his own family by doing the wrong thing.

216

Not to bring race into it, but Scarface is as popular now as it was back then because every two-bit hip hopper is obsessed with the movie.

Without America's fascination with thug music (not the good, underground rap), Scarface wouldn't be so popular

217 HUGE error on my part. Brolin is playing Tom Cheney - Mattie's Father's killer. Barry Pepper is playing Lccky Ned Pepper - the leader of the outlaw gang. Okay - this thing just gained points right there. (Pepper was amazing in the film bio of Dale Earnhardt - underappreciated performance there.)

218 The only good Cher movie is Silkwood

219

How many movies has John Wayne died in the end?

Posted by: polynikes at September 29, 2010 03:55 PM (m2CN7)

I believe 4.

The Shootist, The Alamo, The Cowboys and one more that I can't think of. 

220

Speaking of Academy atrocities AND Scorcese:

Dances with Wolves over Goodfellas.

I don't think anything else needs to be said.

Dances with Wolves to me is in the same boat as There Will be Blood.

If the movies ended after the first hour or hour and thirty minutes, they would have been great.

 

oh, and go get your shinebox.

221
It won't fly. Unless you get a star attached to it. The wizards of smart who run the studios are not showmen. They are MBA's with zero "nose" for show biz. They read statistics which tell them that the movie ticket buyers are all male between the ages of 11 and 24. Big explosions and karate with the occasional shot of poozle. THAT'S ENTERTAINMENT!

Posted by:J.J. Sefton at September 29, 2010 04:04 PM (9Cooa)

Et voilà: Daniel Radcliffe is attached to a remake of All Quiet on the Western Front, slated for 2012.

222

My vote goes to American Beauty. 

Posted by: robviously at September 29, 2010 04:03 PM (N7uu0)

The Constant Gardner annoyed the hell out of me. I was dating a lib chick at the time (yeah, I know) and she insisted on seeing it.

Gah.

And no, I didn't get any.

223

American Beauty really is one of the worst movies of all time, and i'd put Pleasantville right up there with it. Both were nothing more than vehicles for liberals to attack a way of life they detested

I disagree re Pleasantville. Just look at what happened to Witherspoon's character in the end. She opted for school and stability over the promiscuity of her former life.

224 I fucking hated Shakespeare in Love.

225 There is an absolute paucity of films set during World War One or concerning the issues surrounding it. I would think that would make for a great period piece.

You know what would make for some awesome moviemaking?  Certain aspects of the Old Testament.  Sex, murder, prostitutin'... all kinds of fun stuff.  Your King Davids, your Solomons.  The history of Rome in general is bursting with fantastic stories far outside the usual Gladiator realm.  I am reading Potius Pilate right now by Paul Maier and I think it would make for a terrific movie.  Hollywood wouldn't touch it, though, considering the source.

226

sometimes the comment threads are pretty nihilistic

Hey, at least it's an ethos.

227

The only good Cher movie is Silkwood

No love for Mask?

228 The remake of "True Grit" is totally different. In the new one Rooster Cogburn has the patch over the right eye.

229

do you people like anything?

there are a ton of good foreign films out there.

Recently, The Lives of Others was one of the best films i have seen in some time.

Unfortunatley since Blockbuster went out of business and i don't have netflix, it is hard to see new foreign films.

230

I am not anti-remake. Sometimes the remake is better than the original. Example: The original "The Thing" with James Arness sucked glactic donkey dicks, while John Carpenters "The Thing" was fucking awesome and an instant classic.

I do think John Wayne will be tough to top. I didn't watch the trailer, didn't want to download fucking Quicktime.

231

235

3:10 to Yuma - good call. Remake that is better than the original.

236

If you ever wondered why NCIS: LA is so awful compared to the original - that casting, right there (among others).

232 Re Whitman non-scandal:  The LA Times is even a poorer excuse for a "news" organization than NBC.  At least NBC provided the PDF file of the falsified job application, including the fake social security card.

And, btw, what the heck is with Drudge's headline? 

233 251

The only good Cher movie is Silkwood

No love for Mask?

Ahh yeah, forgot about Mask.

234 Posted by: robviously at September 29, 2010 04:02 PM (N7uu0)

I thought the whole movies was a series of half-hearted attempts at Being Profound ( while pretending to be bored with actually showing these images to an audience of  bozos who can't possibly appreciate the genius of we, the Film-makers )

It's hard to pick one scene out, because they all had the same feel:  Now we are showing you that life is a complex riddle which you will never solve.  Change happens but it's a Bitch; Evil is complicated, but simple

As I said, I liked the movie while being very aware of being dissed by a writer and director who assumed I could not appreciate his Artistic Genius.

and I want to use that compressed air thingee on a few people one of these days...

235 The Cape Fear remake, was horrible. DeNiro just over acted to the nth degree. Robert Mitchum (sp?) was the balls in the original. Still one of the truly scary movies of all time. Also Wayne himself made a bunch of re-makes of his own film Rio Bravo. Hitchcock remade The Man Who Knew Too Much and a couple other of his original British films. Hollywood loves remakes. Most of them suck, but that is a point that has been made already. That is all back to lurking. PS Matt Deamon SUCKS!

236

ps....anyone else find it odd that we're five weeks from an historic election and we're spending an entire afternoon on movies??

where the hell is the news? any news??

237

The Shootist, The Alamo, The Cowboys and one more that I can't think of

Well, he dies in Liberty Valance but not during it (if you catch my drift).

 

 

238

Posted by: Bill D. Cat at September 29, 2010 04:00 PM (XDeui)

Yes, it was my daughter.  She is calling the mortgage company today and try to work something out.  Her husband just got a job, so they can manage the payment now.  Just hoping they will work with her.

239 Barry Pepper was also a great Roger Maris in that Billy Crystal movie on the 1961 HR chase.

240

I kind of liked Blood Diamond.

 

241 I'm sorry I can't abide that. Contrast the ending of 3:10 to Yuma.

/SPOILER

Posted by: MikeTheMoose at September 29, 2010 04:07 PM (0q2P7)

Again, it's really easy to say he should have gone after Chigurth when he had the chance when you're just a guy saying how a movie should end.  The Sheriff Bell character acted like a real person who didn't want to die just to provide a dramatic ending for a story.

The Hollywood ending would have had Bell confront Chigurth right before Llewellyn is killed, kill him, and then help Llewellyn escape the Mexicans.  Maybe if they wanted to do a "moral" Hollywood ending, Bell would kill Chigurth but be mortally wounded in the process.  Llewellyn would realize everything he's done wrong as he watches Bell die.  He goes to jail; his wife survives.

242

If you ever wondered why NCIS: LA is so awful compared to the original - that casting, right there (among others).

Posted by: The Q at September 29, 2010 04:11 PM (pfStM)

True dat:  the "LA" cast is diversity-based, with Extra Credit for a British female dwarf as boss.

243 OK, now i see we are on overated films American Beauty - agree. Academy whoring pap Saving private R - Great scenes, but aren't there enough real WWII stories you have go and make up shit? hated it. Titanic - wtf? nothign bothers me more than this over embellished history crap. The story wasn't big enough without forbidden love? ?? - didn't the Titanic director make another movie about blue people, can't think of the name now...

244 I was advised that You've Got Mail was a remake of a Jimmy Stewart movie.  They made chick flicks back then?

It was a remake of The Shop Around the Corner in the barest possible way, in the sense that the two main characters met via correspondence.  The Jimmy Stewart romance flick has actual substance, however, and is therefore a fail in the modern sense of the word. 

Personally, in this political climate, I'd like to see a modern take on Mr. Smith goes to Washington, but we all know how that would go. 

245 I think Ted Turner funded the entire movie didn't he?

Yes he did which makes you wonder why.

246

Saving private R - Great scenes, but aren't there enough real WWII stories you have go and make up shit? hated it.

exactly. 50 million people died, all of them probably had interesting stories, and you had to make up a retarded one?

247

 I think Ted Turner funded the entire movie didn't he?

Yes he did which makes you wonder why.

he's a southerner. Southern pride.

248 Ordinary People was anything but ordinary!!

249

Best Retarded movie ever?

A Knight's Tale.

I think its actually what killed Heath Ledger, it just took some time to finish the job

250

Ordinary People was anything but ordinary!!

Dude, I loved that movie. Still do.

251 244 I was advised that You've Got Mail was a remake of a Jimmy Stewart movie. They made chick flicks back then? The Shop Around The Corner - Fantastic film YGM sucked.

252 do think John Wayne will be tough to top. I didn't watch the trailer, didn't want to download fucking Quicktime.

Posted by: maddogg at September 29, 2010 04:11 PM (OlN4e)

See post #20.

253

Contrast the ending of 3:10 to Yuma.

Gah!!! I hated the ending!!! The original was totally different.

254 "204 MAKE A NEW FUCKING MOVIE GEORGE!!!!!! Be careful what you wish for. The last time that happened, we got JarJar Binks and "I hate sand" as a pickup line." True that but we also got Red Letter Media's movie critique out of it: http://tinyurl.com/29oxjsq

255 I like a lotta movies; the theme was about bad movies ( which are legion )

I think "Twelve O'Clock High" is the best movie ever made, and watching it will improve your life.

and Dr, Strangelove was kinda funny............

PURITY OF ESSENCE, MANDRAKE

256 Personally, I can't wait to see Matt Damon play Sgt. Hartman in the Full Metal Jacket remake.

257 Sorry, but "Titanic" was the supermassive black hole of suck. Gag.

258 Although, 90% of remakes suck balls, I'm actually looking forward to this. 

Right now, Jeff Bridges is the best actor we've got who's not 80 years old (Robert Duvall and Clint Eastwood). 

Besides, here's something else the people who complain about remakes should consider: over the course of your life you'll probably see (or hear of) fifty different versions of Hamlet, yet you'll never any whining about the one with Edwin Booth in 1845 being the bestest ever and therefore they don't need to ever remake that play again.

Just as a restaging of Hamlet with Laurence Olivier, or Kenneth Brannaugh, or Mel Gibson, is a new chance to consider a character in a different ways, so too, can a remade movie be a chance to see what a new set of actors and director can do with the source material.

Yes, John Wayne is a great Rooster Cogburn, but the original movie is more wryly funny than deadly serious.

Why not let the Coen brothers do a version that captures the intensity and horror of teenage girl trying to hunt down a stone-killer like Ned Pepper?

I assume that's why the subtitle of this version is "Retribution". 

259
Nothing on the horizon has the dramatic weight, depth of character, or artistic potential as Lindsay Lohan portraying Linda Lovelace.
It's a stroke of throat clearing box office nitro genius, with a side of German Shepard.

260
Tired of praising Hollywood.  *me*

261 232 do you people like anything?
Posted by: Jones at September 29, 2010 04:07 PM (ZH73Z)

Nihilism ... but you already pointed that out.

262 Fuck this noise.

The Duke > all the rest of the current bankrupt fucksticks.

263 The Michael Bay version of 'On Golden Pond' sounds like the best idea yet.

Posted by: John Galt at September 29, 2010 04:02 PM (F/4zf)

Working title:  Geezer Armageddon

264 Coen brothers. I'll give it a chance.

265

I loved No Country for Old Men. Saw it three times in the theater. Bought it on DVD the day it hit stores and watched it again that night.

Read the book, too, and thought the film was one of the greatest cinematic adaptations of a novel ever made. Absolutely note-perfect.

Of course, I believe Cormac McCarthy is our greatest living novelist and the greatest American man of letters since Hemingway. So, many may not share my affection for the source material.

The end of the movie is fairly straightforward, I think. Here's how it plays out:

Anton Chigurh doesn't kill Lewelyn Moss. The Mexicans do.

Chigurh keeps his promise to Lewelyn and kills Carla Jean because, though evil, he is a man of his word. (Think of the Lawful Evil alignment in D&D.)

Ed Tom Bell does, in fact, go into the motel room at the end. Before he enters he imagines Chigurh inside, waiting on him, and he goes inside anyway. To his great relief the room is empty. Chigurh has been there to retrieve the money, but he is already gone.

Sherrif Bell retires. Not because the world is growing more dangerous, but because he is finally recognizes true evil and finds himself unable to fight it.

266 270 Personally, in this political climate, I'd like to see a modern take on Mr. Smith goes to Washington, but we all know how that would go. Posted by: Filly at September 29, 2010 04:14 PM (GcVt/) It is amazing how that movie rings true today. Especially the scenes where the kids try to get the word out of what's happening and their beaten up by MSM union goons! How prescient was that?!

267

A Knight's Tale.

I think its actually what killed Heath Ledger, it just took some time to finish the job

Oh God,  I had forgotten that horrid movie.

268 Ted Turner gave up his "southernness" long ago. (if he ever had any)

269

Can the remakes of Gone With The Wind and Citizen Kaine be far behind?

GWTW wil never be remade.  Simply cannot come close to the original.  Still stands up today imho.  Vivien Liegh, Clark Cable?? No fucking way anything out of Hollywierd today can come close to the charisma those two had.

Posted by: jewells at September 29, 2010 03:38 PM (l/N7H)

I would like to see a modern adaptation of Gone With the Wind about the Republican takeover in 2010.

The earlier years, when Charlie Rangel and Maxine Waters were happy on the Democrat plantation.  "I don't know nothin' about fillin' out no financial disclosure forms!"

The cruel and heartless Sarah Palin leading the forces burning down Washington.  The city's Democratic majority reduced to smoldering rubble.

Nancy Pelosi making a dress out of the curtains in the Minority Leader's office. "As God is my witness, I shall never be ousted from the Office of the Speaker again!"

Obama as the dashing daredevil who profits from the political turmoil.  "But Barack, if you leave me, where will I go?  What will I do?"

270 There Will Be Blood was mentioned earlier..

I saw that as a modern morality fairy tale.. 

You have Big Religion and Big Oil beating each other up throughout the movie..

It's snuff porn for liberals. 

271

There's also another ending for NCFOM.  When Anton leaves the house after killing the wife, he gets in the car and starts to drive away as he usually does, and then gets broadsided, badly injuring him.  Moral:  No matter how invulnerable one thinks he is, bad shit still happens. 

 

272

I don't know about any of you but I'm pretty certain that I'll take nuclear strength incompetence of abject evil any day:

http://tinyurl.com/36vs8lw

When I look at this, all I see are those illustrations from Dante's Inferno come to life.

Draw your own conclusions.

273
Well....

I'm a big fan of the Coen brothers.  I loved "Raising Arizona" and I liked "Fargo", although I did not think of it as anything humorous.   Those who do are typical coastal elites who like to sneer at those who struggle in flyover country.

This will be a stretch for them since their forte is doing contemporary American stories set in some area of the country foreign to New Yorkers (which come to think of it includes Hoboken.)  But they like to take chances, which is something that you can't say about most of the dreck that comes out of Hollywood.

Jeff Bridges has a damn good sense of what works and I don't see him getting into a screenplay that doesn't hang together.  Duvall would have been a better choice five years ago.  Sadly, he's pushing 79, so I don't know if he could have pulled it off.

Matt Damon?  Well, at least he didn't write the screenplay so we won't see allusions to Howard Zinn.  And if he plays the Glen Cambell role, at least people can see him die a horrible death on the screen.   Ditto for Josh "W" Brolin.

274

Who'll play the rock that squashed Glen Campbell's fucking head in the remake?

My hero!

275

Anton Chigurh doesn't kill Lewelyn Moss. The Mexicans do.

Chigurh keeps his promise to Lewelyn and kills Carla Jean because, though evil, he is a man of his word. (Think of the Lawful Evil alignment in D&D.)

Ed Tom Bell does, in fact, go into the motel room at the end. Before he enters he imagines Chigurh inside, waiting on him, and he goes inside anyway. To his great relief the room is empty. Chigurh has been there to retrieve the money, but he is already gone.

Sherrif Bell retires. Not because the world is growing more dangerous, but because he is finally recognizes true evil and finds himself unable to fight it.

Posted by: Lurk Ness Monster at September 29, 2010 04:21 PM (dUunI)

Maybe.  The movie does not make that clear.  I couldn't get through the book, but maybe you are imposing your own view ( which could have and should have been made more clear in the movie ). 

We are left to wonder, but steered towards Despair

276

'bout the only thing Ted Turner DID fund was Gettysburg. Its been panned, but it was a good representation of the book.

Yep, there is a desperate lack of good cowboy movies from Hollyweird - which is why I rely on my Eastwood/John Wayne DVD collection, until some movie studio grows a pair

"There are two types of men, those that hold the gun, and those that dig..." classic.

277 You know what would make for some awesome moviemaking?  Certain aspects of the Old Testament.  Sex, murder, prostitutin'... all kinds of fun stuff.  Your King Davids, your Solomons.  The history of Rome in general is bursting with fantastic stories far outside the usual Gladiator realm.  I am reading Potius Pilate right now by Paul Maier and I think it would make for a terrific movie.  Hollywood wouldn't touch it, though, considering the source.

Posted by: Filly at September 29, 2010 04:09 PM (GcVt/)

From the 1920s to the 1960s, Hollywood made tons of Biblical epics.  It may be time for a resurgence.

278 "Is that you in there, Ned?"

We grew up using "John Wayne" as a verb, as in "Why don't you just John-Wayne that door in?"

No one can do Rooster other than Wayne.  No one.

Next thing we get will be a Tarantino remake of On the Waterfront.

279

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Sands of Iwo Jima and Wake of the Red Witch.

Posted by: polynikes at September 29, 2010 04:11 PM (m2CN7)

Forgot about those..

280

Ed Tom Bell does, in fact, go into the motel room at the end. Before he enters he imagines Chigurh inside, waiting on him, and he goes inside anyway. To his great relief the room is empty. Chigurh has been there to retrieve the money, but he is already gone.

Sherrif Bell retires. Not because the world is growing more dangerous, but because he is finally recognizes true evil and finds himself unable to fight it.

Posted by: Lurk Ness Monster at September 29, 2010 04:21 PM (dUunI)

Looks like I have to go back and re-watch it.  That's a really cool take on the last motel room scene.

281 Tommy Lee Jones should have nuked the site from orbit.

282 "You get cross-ways of me LeBouef and you'll think a thousand o' brick had fell on ya. You'll wish you was back at the Alamo with Travis!"

283

When I look at this, all I see are those illustrations from Dante's Inferno come to life.

Draw your own conclusions.

Posted by: Hussein the Plumber at September 29, 2010 04:24 PM (RkRxq)

Gee, sanctions on Iran for human rights abuses!  And only 15 months after the Green 88 revolutionaries were gunned down in the streets.  Well, better late and totally half-hearted than never, I guess.

284

I agree with J.J.

138 They got anyone lined up to play the horse yet?

Posted by: Sarah Jessica Parker at September 29, 2010 03:44 PM (QKKT0)

Thread winner.  Maybe winner of teh Internets this week.

285

Sherrif Bell retires. Not because the world is growing more dangerous, but because he is finally recognizes true evil and finds himself unable to fight it.

Posted by: Lurk Ness Monster at September 29, 2010 04:21 PM (dUunI)

By the way, that's definitely because he's an old man too.  You see the contrast between him and his deputy all movie long.  The deputy is a long more gung-ho about tracking down Chigurth.

The movie isn't about despair; it's about one man finding out he can't do what needs to be done anymore.  (And maybe *his* despair over that.)

286

This makes about as much sense as the new Jack Black "Gullivers Travels" movie...

Some things should just NOT be done...

 

287

Ah Victor Mature movies.  Classic.

Posted by: polynikes at September 29, 2010 04:30 PM (m2CN7)

Speaking of Victor Mature, why did they remake Kiss of Death?  Mature wasn't real good in the original (I never thought he was real good in anything) but Richard Widmark's Johnny Udo was so over-the-top that there was no point in doing it over.

288 Final thought on NCFOM someone quoted Good, Bad, Ugly above, and NCOM always reminded me of GBU. very similar in a lot of ways, although GBU has a "happy" hollywood ending of sorts.

289

I am not anti-remake. Sometimes the remake is better than the original.

Agree. Instead making a crappy remake of an old great movie, Hollywood should dare to remake an old crappy movie into a good one.

290 Yep, there is a desperate lack of good cowboy movies from Hollyweird - which is why I rely on my Eastwood/John Wayne DVD collection, until some movie studio grows a pair
----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----

John Favreau is working on it:  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0409847/

291 3:10 to Yuma?

Egads man!

I can't stand Christian Bale.  I could only watch the whole thing because they had one of the worlds greatest actors (Crowe) carrying him throughout the flick.

Hell they could have cast a fucking litterbox as Bales' character and it would have improved the movie 1000 percent.

292

Yep, there is a desperate lack of good cowboy movies from Hollyweird - which is why I rely on my Eastwood/John Wayne DVD collection, until some movie studio grows a pair

 

I read a commentary once that said that "Blazing Saddles" pretty much killed the American western movie.  I agree.

293 Personally, I think it was the perfect role for Wayne and Bridges isn't Western cowboy enough for it. But it will be interesting to see if this remake ends in the same way the novel did.  Portis, who was the original author, changed the ending for the Wayne screenplay to make it a happier one.  This happens alot in the transition from novel to movie, a good example being how The Natural was changed to make it a happy ending.

294

318

 

GAK!!!! Next thing you'll know, Richard Simmons will be the next Captain of the NCC-1701omega.

"Okay, people, people, PEOPLE! Let's get it together, and get into that warp thingie. Oh, and I want to discuss our engine shaft issue, and my promotion to Rear Admiral"

295 John Favreau is badass. He has a blank check chance with me after his work on Iron Man 1 and 2.

I only wish to God he was in charge of Captain America too.

296 The Sheriff Bell character acted like a real person who didn't want to die just to provide a dramatic ending for a story. end the killing spree of a homicidal maniac.

 FIFY.

SPOILER The Natural/NCFOM

Seriously though. If I wanted a sad think think ending with virtually no plot gratification I would read the book. That's why The Natural ends with a Strikeout in the book. I get enough real person let downs everyday I don't need a whole movie, my mindless escape from the everyday, devoted to the topic of "real life sometimes sucks" and "real people sometimes let you down" oh and "bad guys win a lot too"  yeah I know all that. You haven't given me anything "deep" to think about no matter how much you think the topic is"original" and telling me all that and pretty much nothing more over a two hour span is not very entertaining. Oh so you want to make me "think"? Well I think I know enough about "real life", far more than Hollywood, and I think I'll rent a movie that makes me feel better then NCFOM did. (even The Mist has a better ending)


BTW there are plenty of real people who would have done the opposite; those types of real people have stories written about them.

/SPOILER

297

Also, I don't believe the Coens are Hollywood elitists sneering at the flyover yokels who finance their lifestyles. They aren't really Hollywood types at all. They self-financed their first movie, Blood Simple, and they've blazed their own trail since. Did anyone see Barton Fink? It mocks both faux-literate, self-important artistes and souless Hollywood studio executives. The title character, played by John Tuturo, is a limpdick socialist New York playwright who becomes a Los Angeles screenwriter but can't script a simple Wally Beery wrestling picture because he thinks that genre is beneath his talents. Their films may not be your cup of tea, but they aren't intentionally obscure. Joel and Ethan just follow their muse, I think.

298 It's easy to "seek Vengeance or Justice" when you aren't the one who actually has to confront a monster like Anton Chigurth.  That's the whole point.  Tommy Lee Jones (Sheriff Bell) is completely outmatched and he knows it.  He's done.  He's an old man and the world has deteriorated to the point where he can't keep up.  He can either confront Chigurth and die, or go home to his wife.  He chooses the latter.<<<<

And that makes for a pointless film experience.  I *know* how to be a coward.

299

I haven't seen NCFOM, but the ending sounds a lot like if Clarice did the logical thing and left quietly, then waited for back up in Silence of the Lambs.

Yes?

300 While some of you are on the "good candidates for new movie material" kick, I'd like to throw in my two cents: C.S. Lewis' Space Trilogy, especially the last book.  Thoughts, anyone?

301 I see no need to go to the theater until there's a Pixar re-make of Howard's End.

302 Barton Fink is one of my all time favorites. This scene especially

303

I read a commentary once that said that "Blazing Saddles" pretty much killed the American western movie.  I agree.

Blazing Saddles was only a symptom, not the cause.

What killed the American western was pretty much the same thing that's been killing American culture since the 1960s: multiculturalism and relativism.

Plus, during the heyday of the Western, from the 1920s to the late 1950s, Americans weren't that far removed from the Old West.  Buffalo Bill died in 1917, Bat Masterson in 1921, and Wyatt Earp in 1929.

In fact, we're now farther away from the Korean War than the Americans of 1950 were from the last of the Indian wars (Wounded Knee happened in 1890).

Until the late 1940s, most Americans still had personal experience with horses as a part of everyday life. Many American farmers still plowed with mules, and there were horse-drawn wagons still in use in many cities. 

304 @333 a very good summation, I agree. I think as close as the Coen bros. got to elitism was in "Raising Arizona" where most of the characters were highly flawed to the point of being stereotypes. But then, most people with criminal intent are highly flawed, by definition.

305

Remakes I'd LIKE to see?

Starship Trooper done right... how can you have a CAP Trooper without Powered Battle Armor?

New movies?

Tactics of Mistake... the first Dorsai novel..

Hammers Slammers... big bad ass HOVER TANKS!

306 I think empathy with the native Americans changed the Western genre, starting perhaps with "Little Big Man", which I liked.

307 Posted by: DelD at September 29, 2010 04:51 PM (+39ph)

I agree:  Don't kill the messenger; don't confuse the symptom with the disease

Hollywood and the pop culture media gave us a steady diet of bullshit in the late 60s and early 70s ( I was there; I saw it all unfold )

308 I haven't seen NCFOM, but the ending sounds a lot like if Clarice did the logical thing and left quietly, then waited for back up in Silence of the Lambs.

Yes?

SPOILER NCFOM

Not exactly. Bell just leaves. He makes no effort to call for backup and cover the suspect to ensure he doesn't escape. And BTW he knew he had been "made" that the killer knew he was in the hotel room with him. The only reason Bell didn't get in a fight is because the killer did not know that Bell knew he was there. So he was quietly hiding, hoping Bell would go away. Which he does, letting the killer escape, allowing him to kill the innocent Carla Jean.

/SPOILER

309 Seriously though. If I wanted a sad think think ending with virtually no plot gratification I would read the book. That's why The Natural ends with a Strikeout in the book. I get enough real person let downs everyday I don't need a whole movie,

Posted by: MikeTheMoose at September 29, 2010 04:40 PM

See that's the problem with changing things in movies that are important to the bool's theme or story.  Malamud's book had an almost entirely different theme than the movie, it wasn't just the ending.  Yeah, it's nice to escape and have fun at movies, so why not find books that fit that genre.  Why change an excellent novel just to make people happy when there are plenty of other books to adapt?  IAt the time it was said that it was Redford who wanted the chnages because he wanted to be a hero. 

310 Many American farmers still plowed with mules, and there were horse-drawn wagons still in use in many cities.

Yep, when I was a kid in the 50s we had an old black farmer who came around in a mule wagon every Spring to plow back yards for people wanting a garden and in the middle of the Summer he came around with bushel baskets of peas.

All that meant more work for me.

311 138 They got anyone lined up to play the horse yet?

Posted by: Sarah Jessica Parker at September 29, 2010 03:44 PM (QKKT0)

 

hahahahahahahaha.....good one.

312

One thing that gets me about the Coen Brothers' supposedly "more faithful to the book" version of True Grit - why didn't they portray Rooster Cogburn the way Mattie describes him in the book, as resembling Grover Cleveland?  Small thing, maybe, but it beats that bizarrely anachronistic homeless Kris Kristofferson thing that Bridges sports in this version.

313

Leave it to the Cohen brothers to be daring.

 

Imagine casting Matt Damon in True Grit as the female lead!

314 I'm generally anti-remake but this looks kick-ass

315

I don't believe that my interpretation of the end of the cinematic No Country for Old Men is projection on my part. In both the book and the movie, Ed Tom Bell goes back to the motel where Lewelyn died to look for the money that so many have died for.

At the motel, he finds the lock missing. He's seen this before, at Lewelyn's trailer. He draws his sidearm, which is unusual. Remember the praise of the old lawman who never even carried a gun in the voice-over at the opening? He also declined to draw his firearm when he and his deputy entered Moss's trailer. Not only does he draw his gun, he cocks it. We, as the audience, know that he's taking this very seriously.

He imagines that the unstoppable killer is inside, waiting behind the door. The Coens added the brief shots of Chigurh illuminated by the light streaming through the hole left by the missing lock. McCarthy doesn't include it the book. The directors want the audience to know what's going through the old Sherriff's mind as he stands outside. Even though he knows the risk he's taking, he pushes the door open.

 He enters the motel room to find evidence that Chigurh has been there and retrieved the money from Lewelyn's hiding place. Chigurh unscrewed the ventilation grate with a dime, just as he did in the other motel, earlier in the movie. We know this really happens, because Ed Tom cannot make up the details of the grate and the dime. He doesn't know that Lewelyn has been hiding the satchel in the ventilation systems or that Anton Chigurh uses the coins in his pocket to unscrew the grates. As the audience, we have seen these things before. Ed Tom hasn't.

The narrator isn't unreliable, because there is no one narrator. Unreliable narrators are usually first-person narrators. Think of that awful short story The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman which you probably read in college. The unreliable narration is from the first-person perspective. Omniscent third-person narrators are rarely unreliable. We don't only see the events from Ed Tom's point of view. We also follow Chigurh, Lewelyn, Carla Jean, and Carson Wells at various points in the movie. It's a third-person narrator.

Besides, the interpretation that, somehow, to see Chigurh is to die is misconcieved. The old man running gas station isn't killed. The receptionist in the trailer park office who tells him that she "can't give out no information" about the residents doesn't die, either. Neither do the woman who rents him the motel room or the boys who find Chigurh after the car wreck. Someone is over-analyzing the movie if they believe that to see Anton Chigurh is to meet your end.

I might have overdone it with this post. Sorry if I got windy there.

316 Matt Damon Can Suck my Ball Sweat.  WTF is Eastwood making so many movies with this sack o shit.  Must be old age. 

317 Many American farmers still plowed with mules, and there were horse-drawn wagons still in use in many cities.<<<<

When my father was young there were still a fair number of Civil War veterans living.  He and his father (tenant farmer, born in a log cabin in Kentucky) plowed with mules and horses until probably the late forties, early fifties.  My father still feels himself very close to the days of the cowboy, and regards the decline and degradation of the western as a deep loss to the American psyche.

318 My grandpa plowed with a mule in Missouri up until they moved to California in the late 40's. All of my Dad's family could saddle a horse and hitch a wagon from a young age. Out here in the West the traditions like that die hard. Even though we used tractors and machinery by the time I came along, you could still find horses and cattle on lots of farms. They were just more for rodeo and recreational riding.

But in California they beat it out of us in school. All my commie "Social Studies" teachers pounded it into us that all cowboys were genocidal Indian killers and that the American West was stolen from peaceful Mexico.

Having parents that gave a shit and told me the truth is all that saved us kids from becoming the limp-dicked commies our teachers wanted.

By the time we graduated high school my Brother and I both had been sent to the principal's office for arguing with a teacher about westerns and cowboys.

Although, looking back, I think my fight was about the movie The Green Berets.

319 I want to see a remake of Eminem's 8 Mile with Jonny 5 in the starring role!

320 Hollywood doesn't do remakes well. Period. And they ain't improving.

I love John Wayne and what I consider his meticulous attention for facts and details.
Yes, I know there are a few flaws - but that is what happens in every instance of art imitating real life - you cannot slap 1 or 2 hours of flim together and get a chunk of life 100%.
Nevertheless and be that as it may - I love John Wayne very dearly on many levels - his honesty, and his Americanism obviously at the top of it - and after his long history, of wonderful characters, that big craggy face and wonderful blue eyes, and that tired but determined steel that is all too rare, these days.

But as much as I always admired John Wayne, I really could not stand Glenn Campbell.
Oh, he was cute at first, but for some reason, it wore thin really quick, and I am sure he must have run off with Mac Davis' wife before True Grit because when True Grit came out I hated him so badly.
Well, I am wrong - he married Sarah Davis in '76, and made True Grit in '69.
But I still didn't like him at all by then.  So I don't know why - but he proved to be the sidewinder I thought he was, anyway.

So a remake of the movie I could never fully enjoy as a John Wayne movie isn't  in and of itself a bad thing.  Hollywood's sheer stupidity when it comes to remakes is.
Which Hollywood in my mind so often is very incredibly Stupid.
They have a bad habit of making the script worse and the casting even worse than that.

We all realize how hard it is to keep coming up with new plots, and that movies and TV all rehashed all the plots to pieces.
Shame none of them try to achieve a high level of competition of quality, when they do.
But they are big on standing around congratulating themselves as if they surpassed anyone's wildest imaginations.
And looking incredibly stupid doing it.

Best all time remake I ever saw was John Wayne's Rio Bravo. John Wayne's remake of Bogie and Baby's "To Have and Have Not".

Run them back to back a few times and pull it out.

Great fun!

321 Isn't Damon queer?  He looks queer.  Bridges is just useless.  This is so stupid as to be sad. 

322 I'm not keen on remakes, especially of movies that I loved as the original, True Grit being a prime example.

But, it's a great story and maybe it deserves a re-telling. I think the major concern is that someone will fuck it up.

I looked at the trailer and it doesn't look too bad, so we shall see.

(btw, went through all of this with The Alamo remake, and the remake, while not my favorite, was a decent rendering of the story)

323 I'd only watch this if Matt Damon got killed and then scalped in the first 60 seconds of the film.

John Wayne is turning over in his grave. RIP.

324 >>I was advised that You've Got Mail was a remake of a Jimmy Stewart movie. They made chick flicks back then?<< It wasn't a chick-flick, it was a Romantic-Comedy. Which, intriguingly enough, didn't used to be chick-flicks. Shop Around The Corner is typical of the age: two strong characters trying to work out how they're going to get together. Ironically, after 30 years of feminism, Meg Ryan's character was a sniveling weakling, the kind that Hepburn or O'Hara (or even Margaret Sullavan) would've chewed up.

325 The Coens are giants in a giant industry.  They never should have gotten away with killing the hero at the beginning of the last act though.  I still don't get it.  I spent the next twenty minutes wondering why.  Miller's Crossing and Hudsucker Proxy were better movies.

326 Fill your hand, pilgrim!

327

They never should have gotten away with killing the hero at the beginning of the last act though.

Wait.....Llewelyn Moss was the hero?  Major protagonist, maybe, but only in the context of sharing the limelight with Sheriff Bell and Anton Chigurh.  I'm not convinced  No Country had a hero as such.  (Incidentally, did any one else see what looked like a deliberate effort at parallelism in the actions of Chigurh following his accident and those of Moss crossing over into Mexico after his fire-fight with Chigurh, almost as if the Coens are suggesting that Chigurh is about to begin walking the path Moss walked, to a similar lethal conclusion.  Watch it again - it's all duplicated, right down to Chigurh's purchase of a shirt.)

328

Sheriff Bell did nothing to propel the story.  He can't be a hero.  Between Chigurh and Moss, who did you want to succeed?  I like Anton Chigurh's work rate, but Moss is caught up in the gears.

329 I dunno - that's the thing here, that none of them could be described as heroes.  If you're looking at it in terms of whom the audience is rooting for, then for me it would be Bell, who's a far more appealing character than Moss or Chigurh, and stands for something larger than himself, even if he doesn't live up to the best traditions of being a peace officer.  As far as Moss and Chigurh, Chigurh is a near passion-free engine of destruction, and Moss is determined to ride a consignment of Cartel money to his definition of the good life, no matter who gets hurt along the way, an ambition clouded by the fact that he's neither as smart, tough, or lucky as he believes himself to be - truth be told, I couldn't root for either one.

330 John Wayne's character died in The Fighting Seabees, too.

331

"Found money" has a long history in storytelling.  The most common use is "found money knows no good."  Chigurh and Moss are bound by the same goal.  Moss is an everyman against a monster.  The natural inclination is toward Moss.  And they killed him on page 90 without a payoff!   

332 Matt Damon? I'll catch it on veetle two weeks after it comes out.

333 Jeff Bridges looks awesome and crusty, but ... again, why?

334 3:10 to Yuma - good call. Remake that is better than the original.

What handful of hallucenogens are you on??? That was a horrible movie.

335 Does it have that Barton Fink feeling?

336  Hey Ben,

Not talking shit or anything, but where are you from and what do you do? Not stalking, just trying to figure out how you could grow up so different than my 'norm'.

You can't stand John Wayne movies, you like pretentious foreign crap, and you're a Conservative. This doesn't jive with my outdated sensibilities.

And, no, I don't like the cut of your jib, and I doubt there's anything in your newsletter that I would want to read.

Best regards,

337 I care. 

338 True Grit? Never heard of it...

339 John Wayne was killed on screen in The Shootist (shot), The Cowboys (shot), The Alamo(speared, blown-up), The Sands of Iwo Jima(shot), The Fighting Seabees(shot, blown-up), Wake of the Red Witch (drowned), and Reap the Wild Wind (attacked by a giant squid, drowned). John Wayne died in Jet Pilot, The Conqueror, and The Barbarian and the Geisha, but, Hollywood terminator that he was, he kept getting back up.

340 well now...

341 It's a totally unnecessary remake, but Jeff Bridges is who I would have picked to play Rooster Cogburn. As much as I despise Brolin and Damon, it still lools good and I'll probably see it. Such is the power of the Coens.