Proverbs 28:1 tells us “The wicked flee where none pursueth.” So it is with the coward Tom Chaney, the wanted outlaw in Joel and Ethan Coen’s adaptation of Charles Portis’s True Grit. Their title card at the beginning of the film leaves out the second part of that proverb: “But the righteous are bold as a lion.” So it is with Mattie Ross, the 14 year old girl who hires Marshal Rooster Cogburn to take her on an expedition into Indian country to capture the man who shot and killed her father. Although Mattie seeks out Cogburn because she heard he’s a man with “true grit,” the story reveals that in fact she is the one with that attribute.
