I don’t get out to the movies on a regular basis, but I when I saw that the Coen brothers had dared to do a remake of the John Wayne classic, True Grit I decided I had to see it.

I’m glad I did. It’s a terrific movie. In spirit, the Coen Brothers True Grit is more nearly a well-imagined version of the True Grit of novelist Charles Portis than a remake of the somewhat broadly comic John Wayne version. Portis’ novel, originally serialized in the Saturday Evening Post, is perfect fodder for the Coen brothers—a darkly comic story, filled with violence and unique characters.

The broad outlines of the story are known to anyone who has seen the Wayne version (is there anyone who hasn’t seen the original?), so there’s no need to go into it here. Some of the details have changed, though, and especially the ending, which is at best bittersweet. If you’ve read the novel  (and I recommend that you do so—my own copy is a 1968 paperback), you’ll know that the Coen brothers version is true to the source. In truth, I’d always felt a bit cheated by the Wayne version’s ending, happy as it is.

The acid test for the film is in Jeff Bridges’ interpretation of the character Wayne turned into an Oscar winner (although many argue that it was more of a lifetime achievement award). In this, Bridges does an outstanding job. It was impossible for me not to think of Wayne in every scene, but only because Bridges is doing the same role, in the same scenes, with much the same lines. To Bridges’ credit, however, most of my thoughts ran to the contrast, rather than the comparison. Bridges’ Rooster Cogburn is more serious, and dryly funny.

Hailee Steinfeld was better cast in the Mattie Ross than Kim Darby. Darby, who likely was in her twenties, was playing an older teen. Steinfeld is closer to the young teen of the book. In any event, Steinfeld puts in a great performance.

As for Matt Damon’s LaBoeuf, I’m torn. I really liked Glenn Campbell in the original, and always wondered why he didn’t do more movie roles. Damon played LaBoeuf as not terribly bright and not, I think, particularly likable. But to be fair, the Coen brothers’ LaBoeuf didn’t occupy the same space as the original. Campbell’s character was heroic and nearly always in the thick of the story. Damon’s was not onscreen for much of the time, having a tendency to head off on his own, returning for key scenes.

I’ll give this True Grit an “A” and even go so far as to say that it was worth the $18 it cost us to see it on the silver screen.

I was watching Goldfinger the other night on television and chuckled a bit when Auric Goldfinger apologized for his caddy, Odd Job, saying “Golf is not yet the national sport of Korea.”

I don’t think he could make that statement today.

Golf - Links in Time (A&E DVD Archives)

From A&E and The History Channel. I vaguely remember enjoying this when watching on television and am wondering if I want out the bucks to have a dvd copy.

Handicapped: A Documentary About Bad Golf

Grade: A+
Teacher’s Comments: The Spinal Tap of Golf Movies

If you’ve seen the mockumentaries “This Is Spinal Tap”, “A Mighty Wind” or “Best In Show,” you have an idea of what to expect from “Handicapped: A Documentary About Bad Golf.” It’s an absolutely hilarious look at a private tournament for bad golfers, delivered in a totally deadpan, documentary style.

Leading man in the drama is Al Doermat, a porta potty millionaire, whose enthusiasm for golf is as strong as his swing is bad. Yearning for competition, yet stymied by a lack of skill, in 1994 Doermat founded the “Al’s Average Man Invitational,” a private tournament that initially had a $100,000 prize (paid for by Al).

The movie covers the 2006 tournament, where, fortified by Buick and Wilson Golf sponsorships, the prize had risen to $250,000. Thirty golfers received invitations to the tryouts, which involved a skills competition designed to weed out the bad golfers from the truly horrible (I won’t tell you how they resolved that one—it’d spoil the fun). The thirty were reduced to eleven (including Al), who then proceeded to play a nine hole elimination tournament. On each hole, the player with the highest score is eliminated, while the remainder proceed to the next tee.

Narrated by a local sports caster with utter seriousness, the documentary covers the Average Man Invitational as though it were the final day of the Masters. How the sportscaster was able to keep a straight face is beyond me. The players are utterly, hopelessly inept. Worse, though, are their bizarre personalities, and apparent indifference to (or ignorance of) their own embarrassing play.

Interestingly, among the competitors is John Barmon, who played Spaulding Smails in Caddyshack. Not surprisingly, he gets asked a few questions about appearing in that movie. Another cast member is named Tom Coyne, who claims to be an author;Tom Coyne also is the name of a relatively famous golf author, but it can’t possibly be the same guy.

There also are a couple of funny subplots. One involves the caddymaster’s futile attempts to find caddies for the competitors. The other is a running feud between two of Al’s employees who are helping at the event.

The producers have done an excellent job grounding in reality an otherwise surrealistic event. There’s little in the film to break the suspension of disbelief—other than the name of the sponsor, Al Doermat Al has never been competitive in his own bad golfers tournament, and thus truly is a doormat for throwing away hundreds of thousands of his own money. There’s even a website for Al’s Average Man Tournament. The producers maintain that it’s a real event, but I prefer to think of it as fictional.

Either way, it’s an extremely funny film, and would make a great gift for the golfer in your life.

The Foursome

Grade: C
Teacher’s Comments: The Big Chill, it ain’t

In The Foursome, four college buddies and their wives meet for the first time in years at a college reunion. The husbands play a couple of rounds of golf, the wives gossip, and they all get drunk at the evening dances. Most of the movie takes place on the golf course, where the guys catch up on their lives since last they met. An out of control bet on the match provides a bit of dramatic tension.

The characters are pretty stock. There’s the millionaire with the trophy wife, the salesman with a stale marriage, the guy who never grew up and never married, and the fat goofy guy. Of the group, only the goofy guy was original—he and his wife have an overactive sex life and a pile of kids.

During the course of the film, we learn about their business dealings, college era flings with a girl who now is one of the foursome’s wives (she refers to herself as the college slut), one character’s sterility, another’s love child, the problems of a stale marriage, the details of a lively one, and much more. Then there’s a wild party, sex at the water hazard, and an affair that almost happens.

Stop me if you’ve heard this before. Most of this ground has already been covered—with much better acting, direction and production values—in The Big Chill. In fact, I’ll bet the producers thought that what they had on their hands was a latter day version of that classic. There’s even a scene or two of the characters singing along to a rock anthem.

Unfortunately, the movie pales on comparison to The Big Chill. It’s more like a made-for-television movie, except for some bad language and one nude scene with a slightly overweight middle aged woman. In spite of the presence of B list star Kevin Dillon, the film skipped the theatres and went straight to DVD.

The golf scenes aren’t anything special, consisting mostly of a guy taking a swing, while another announces the result. Weirdly for a “golf movie,” the audience almost never sees the ball land. There’s just Kevin Dillon saying: “That’s eight feet from the pin,” or “That’s in the trap.

Aside from tees and a couple of traps, the movie shows virtually nothing of the course. In fact, at times, it was hard to tell that they were actually one one.

Of course, the movie isn’t really about the golf. Golf is just the vehicle through which the characters are revealed. It could just as easily have been about bowling, or ice fishing.

The Foursome apparently is based loosely on a stage play by the same name, written by Canadian playwright Norm Foster. In the stage version, there are just four actors, and consists of 18 scenes—each at a different hole’s tee during a single round of golf. The play sounds neat, and I’m going to keep my eye open for a performance in my area.

As for the movie, I think it’s worth a watch if—like me—you catch it on cable.

Every guy of a certain age remembers the thrill of watching Steve McQueen evade his Nazi pursuers on a motorcycle in the classic movie “The Great Escape.” Based on the real-life mass escape of prisoners from Stalag Luft III during World War II, the movie had an all star, all-testosterone cast that included not only ultimate-guy Steve McQueen, but also James Coburn, James Garner, Charles Bronson, Richard Attenborough and Donald Pleasance.

It turns out that digging tunnels was not the only thing the prisoners did, and that their ingenuity was not all focused on making fake passports and other gear. They also made golf equipment and constructed a golf course with the permission of the commandant.

There’s an article in the Birmingham Mail about one of the surviving hand made golf balls from Stalag Luft III. It’s in a case in a course in England.

Happpy Birthday to Randolph Scott!

Scott (1898 - 1987) has long been my favorite western actor, especially in the films that he made from 1956 to 1960 with director Budd Boetticher. In those films, Scott, at an age when most leading men were winding down their careers, managed to revive his—and cement his place in cinema history. The Scott-Boetticher films are edgy, especially for the 1950s. Scott’s characters are not-quite-heroes; the villains are evil, but complex.

Quentin Tarantino says that acknowledged the influence of the Boetticher films on his own work by naming one of the characters in Kill Bill, Budd.sa

With a screenplay by Detroit native Elmore Leonard, The Tall T is my favorite Randolph Scott film. It’s what you might expect from Leonard—dark and complex, with interesting characters. In The Tall T, Scott is captured—along with the other passengers on a stagecoach—by a group of outlaws led by Richard Boone. Some of the gang members are homicidal maniacs, but Scott and Boone recognize in each other kindred spirits who, but for the kidnapping, might have been friends.

There are appreciations of some of those films here, and here.

Scott retired from film in 1962, after making Ride The High Country, a film by Sam Peckinpah. It was the director’s first feature film, and a tribute to the passing of the old west. In it, Scott and Joel McCrae play a pair of over-the-hill gunfighters who are hired to escort a shipment of gold. Scott plans to doublecross his friend McCrae and steal the gold, but in the end does the right thing. The ending of Ride The High Country is quite emotional and always leaves me with a tear in my eye.

Scott was a good golfer—a six handicapper—who played in the first Crosby Clambake in 1937 at the Rancho Santa Fe Golf Club near San Diego. He also was a course designer, having laid out the Creste Verde Golf club in 1927.

The photo above shows Scott in 1962. I believe that the woman in the cart is his wife—I’ve seen her in other photos. (photo from Flickr) I’ve also seen—but have not been able to find—a couple of photos of Scott in golf attire and one with Gene Littler at the Crosby. I’d like to have copies of those for my wall.

Scott’s reputation has taken a bit of a beating in recent years as he has become sort of a gay icon. The rumors stem from the ten years that he shared a beach house with Cary Grant— a place known as Bachelor Hall. If you run a search, you’ll find plenty of photos of Scott and Grant originating from alternative lifestyle websites. Grant and Scott, however, always denied the rumors—and certainly had more than their share of romantic trysts with leading starlets. Scott friend and director Budd Boetticher has this to say about the rumors: “Bullshit.”

But it doesn’t matter. Scott’s legacy is in his film, not his social life. And his films are timeless.