Stanley Fish on True Grit: A Truly Religious Movie

A very interesting review. I have not seen True Grit, but I plan to. I have been increasingly provoked by the scriptural revelation to the Prophet Isaiah, "My ways are not your ways, nor my thoughts your thoughts," says the Lord.  This does place man at a distance, or shall we say, man keeps his distance, from God. Christ makes God present (as he is God, and God with us), but our assumption that being with Christ or being "in Christ" is merely a matter of affirmation and keeping to a respectable level of decency just can't be the whole story. Not if Isaiah heard rightly.

Comments

[Janet Cupo]

(spoilers ahead) I agree with Mr. Fish that the Coen Brothers' True Grit is a better movie than the original. I also agree that it is a religious movie, or at least a movie about eternal verities, however, I disagree about the message of the movie, and I vehemently disagree that the pit and Mattie's snakebite are just arbitrary evils that occur in an evil world. From the beginning, Mattie is given a choice between vengeance (not justice, but vengeance) and mercy, and she steadfastly clings to vengeance, forgetting that there is a pit behind her. Ever since I got home from the movie on Sunday, I have been thinking about all the indications that this is true, from the fact that as she leaves the boarding house to begin her quest, she reaches for an apple, to the events surrounding and following the snakebite. I'm going to see it again tomorrow so I can watch it in the light of all this, and to particularly pay attention to the use of Scripture. I think I might have to buy that book today, too, although I live about 30 miles from a half-way decent bookstore.

AMDG, Janet

[Janet Cupo]

I write so well that even spammers are impressed. ;-)

[Janet Cupo]

Well, maybe, but it seemed more to me that she had lost something vital and it was a permanent loss.

AMDG, Janet

[Nick Milne]

It was a marvelous film, and Fish is saying some worthwhile things about this.

On a similar note, I'd like to emphasize just how excellent a companion piece this newer version of the thing makes to The Night of the Hunter, an astounding piece of work in its own right and one of the Coens' favourite movies. Carter Burwell's score in True Grit is substantially a riff on the ominous hymn ("Leaning on Jesus") that Robert Mitchum's "Preacher" Harry Powell is always singing to himself in Hunter, and the version of the hymn that is sung over True Grit's closing credits is the same one Powell sings - that is, the version in which the "on Jesus" is entirely omitted, and one simply leans.

There are other resonances, too. The general themes of a relentless pursuit and the difficulty of child-like innocence are to be found in both, but in True Grit the hunter is no longer a wolf. This time, it's the wolf who's being hunted.

Anyway, there are still more little things that will leap out to those who have seen both films (or who have at least watched Night of the Hunter as obsessively and frequently as I have), like the similarity of certain actors and voices, or the ethereal silhouetted horse-and-rider-at-twilight sequence near the end. The two would make for a fascinating back-to-back viewing experience, and I may try to do that pretty soon to see what else turns up.

[Janet Cupo]

The song that's sung at the end is Leaning on the Everlasting Arms

AMDG

[Jim Kushiner]

Ah, Nick! Someone who LOVES The Night of the Hunter as much as I do! One of my very favorite movies of all time. To have it compared to the new True Grit in this way makes the latter a must-see for me now without question.

[Rob G]

"The song that's sung at the end is Leaning on the Everlasting Arms"

Yes, and in the original version Jesus' name does not appear. It is often sung in the chorus of the song as an addendum of sorts, however.

It's been many, many years since I've seen the older film, but I definitely agree that the new one is one of the best films of the year, and it's arguably the best new Western since 'The Unforgiven.' It's also important to note that as far as I can tell the Coens did not re-do the old film, but instead worked from the novel. In that sense it's probably not strictly accurate to call it a re-make.

Besides 'The Night of the Hunter' it would also be interesting to compare it with John Ford's great 'The Searchers,' in which a group of men led by John Wayne go after a young girl who's been kidnapped by Indians.

[Nick Milne]

Thanks for the clarification, Rob; the way they distinguished between the two versions in Hunter had led me to believe that Powell was sinisterly omitting it on purpose (though I suppose he easily could have been even with the legitimacy of the variance). It seems I'm not very well-up on my late 19th C. American hymnody!

The difference between the two versions continues to work well within the context of Hunter, in any event, but I'll take it as less significant in terms of True Grit as a consequence - though I maintain that the Coens' decision to use that hymn in the first place, given their oft-stated admiration for Hunter, is worth noting.

[Rob G]

I didn't know that the Coens were fans of NOTH, but if that's the case then I too wouldn't be surprised if the use of the song was intentional.

[Devremülk]

Nice post. I love it. Waiting your new posts. Thank you...

[Janet]

Well, this is an old post and I don't know if Nick will see this, but I just finished watching Night of the Hunter and he is really right about their being good companion pieces.

(Spoilers)Another similarity that I noticed was that in both movies there is a big bowl of big apples. In True Grit, Mattie reaches out for these apples right before she leaves to find Chaney. I'm pretty sure that reaching out for the forbidden fruit can't be just a coincidence and it seems that she is stealing them from her landlady--the landlady that is so avaricious that she charged Mattie a nickel for a sack to tote her gun.

In NOTH, the bowl of apples comes at the end of the movie when John takes an apple out of the bowl and wraps it up in a doily to give it to the beneficent old woman who has taken him in (along with several other orphans) and protected him from Powell.

And John, instead of pursuing the vengeance that Mattie is so set upon, actually refuses to testify at in court at the trial of his mother's murderer.

I also wanted to mention that while Powell does not sing the little "Leaning on Jesus" riff in the hymn, the Lillian Gish character does add it in when he is singing outside her house and she is sitting with her gun ready to protect the children.

AMDG,
Janet