Editing True Grit (1969 film) (section)

==Production==

=== Casting ===
[[Mia Farrow]] was originally cast as Mattie and was keen on the role. However, prior to filming, she made the film ''[[Secret Ceremony]]'' in England with [[Robert Mitchum]], who advised her not to work with director [[Henry Hathaway]] because he was "cantankerous". Farrow asked producer [[Hal B. Wallis]] to replace Hathaway with [[Roman Polanski]], who had directed Farrow in ''[[Rosemary's Baby (film)|Rosemary's Baby]]'', but Wallis refused. Farrow quit the film, which was then offered to [[Michele Carey]],  [[Sondra Locke]] and [[Tuesday Weld]], but all three were under contract for another film. John Wayne met [[Karen Carpenter]] at a talent show he was hosting and recommended her for the part, though the producers decided against it because she had no acting experience. Wayne had also lobbied for his daughter Aissa to win the part. [[Olivia Hussey]] was also offered the role by Wallis, but the offer was rescinded after she said she "couldn't see herself with Wayne" and said that he "can't act."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hussey |first1=Olivia |title=The Girl on the Balcony |publisher=Kensington Books |year=2018 |isbn=978-1-496-71707-8 |location=London |pages=84–85}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |author=Groucho |title=Groucho Reviews: Interview: Olivia Hussey—Romeo and Juliet |url=http://production.grouchoreviews.com/interviews/229 |access-date=4 January 2023 |website=Groucho Reviews}}</ref> After also considering [[Sally Field]], the role went to 21-year-old dancer-turned-actress [[Kim Darby]].{{sfn|Davis|2002|p=286}}

[[Elvis Presley]] was the original choice for LaBoeuf, but the producers turned him down when his agent demanded top billing over both Wayne and Darby. [[Glen Campbell]] was then cast instead. In multiple interviews, Campbell claimed that Wayne, along with his daughter,<ref>{{Cite web |date=November 13, 2011 |title=Country music singer Glen Campbell talks about John Wayne |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13Gt_103Y1w |website=[[YouTube]]}}</ref> approached him backstage at his show, and asked him if he would like to be in a movie.

=== John Wayne's involvement ===
Wayne began lobbying for the part of [[Rooster Cogburn (character)|Rooster Cogburn]] after reading [[True Grit (novel)|the novel]] by [[Charles Portis]]. He called [[Marguerite Roberts]]' script "the best script he had ever read", and was instrumental in getting her script approved and credited to her name after Roberts had been blacklisted for alleged leftist affiliations years before. This came in spite of Wayne's own conservative ideals.{{sfn|Shepherd|Slatzer|Grayson|2002|p=274}} He particularly liked the scene with Darby where Rooster tells Mattie about his life in [[Illinois]] (where he has a restaurant, his wife Nola leaves him because of his degenerate friends, and has a clumsy son named Horace), calling it "about the best scene I ever did".{{sfn|Ebert|2011|p=164}} [[Garry Wills]] notes in his book, ''John Wayne's America: The Politics of Celebrity'', that Wayne's performance as Rooster Cogburn bears close resemblance to the way [[Wallace Beery]] portrayed similar characters in the 1930s and 1940s, an inspired if surprising choice on Wayne's part. Wills comments that it is difficult for one actor to imitate another for the entire length of a movie and that the Beery mannerisms temporarily recede during the aforementioned scene in which Cogburn discusses his wife and child.{{sfn|Wills|1997|p=286}}

After reading ''True Grit'' by Charles Portis, Wayne was enthusiastic about playing the part of Rooster Cogburn, but as production got closer, Wayne got jumpy — he did not have a handle on how to play Rooster Cogburn. He was, of course, nervous because the part was out of his comfort zone and had not been specifically tailored to his screen character by one of his in-house screenwriters. Henry Hathaway, who directed the film, calmed Wayne's doubts, most notably concerning the eye patch which was made of gauze, allowing Wayne to see.{{sfn|Eyman|2014|pp=442–443}} John Wayne thought the picture had been edited too tightly by Hathaway. Nevertheless, in May 1969, a few weeks before the picture was released, Wayne wrote to Marguerite Roberts thanking her for her "magnificent" screenplay, especially for the beautiful ending in the cemetery that she had devised in Portis's style.{{sfn|Eyman|2014|p=448}} Wayne and Kim Darby worked very well together, but Henry Hathaway disliked her, stating: "My problem with her was simple, she's not particularly attractive, so her book of tricks consisted mostly [of] being a little cute. All through the film, I had to stop her from acting funny, doing bits of business and so forth."{{sfn|Eyman|2014|p=445}}

=== Filming ===
Hathaway says he decided to make the film like "a fairytale... a fantasy that I couched in as realistic terms as possible."<ref name="hen">{{cite magazine|magazine=Take One|first=Scott|last=Eyman|title='I made movies' an interview with Henry Hathaway|url=https://archive.org/details/sim_take-one_september-october-1974_5_1/page/8/mode/1up|date=September–October 1974|page=12}}</ref>

Filming took place mainly in [[Ouray County, Colorado]], in the vicinity of [[Ridgway, Colorado|Ridgway]] (now the home of the True Grit Cafe), around the town of [[Montrose, Colorado|Montrose]] (in Montrose County), and the town of [[Ouray, Colorado|Ouray]].<ref>{{cite news |last1=Higgins |first1=Jim |first2=Shirley Rose |last2=Higgins |title=Movie Fan's Guide to Travel |newspaper=[[Chicago Tribune]] |date=March 22, 1970 |page=H14 }}</ref>{{sfn|Shepherd|Slatzer|Grayson|2002|p=274}}<ref>{{cite AV media|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EUP9rOLf30| archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211118/0EUP9rOLf30| archive-date=2021-11-18 | url-status=live|publisher=[[YouTube]]|author=JeepsterGal|date=October 3, 2007|access-date=July 18, 2018|title=John Wayne in True Grit, Then and Now, Extended Video}}{{cbignore}}</ref> (The script maintains the novel's references to place names in Arkansas and Oklahoma, in dramatic contrast to the Colorado topography.) The courtroom scenes were filmed at Ouray County Courthouse in Ouray.<ref>{{cite news |last=Parry |first=Will H. |title=Born-Again Boom Town |publisher=[[Copley Press|Copley News Service]] |newspaper=[[Moscow-Pullman Daily News]] |page=5D |date=November 22, 1990 }}</ref>{{sfn|Gelbert|2002|p=44}}

[[File:Ouray County CO Court House 1881 2006 01 13.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Ouray County Courthouse, constructed in 1888]]

The scenes that take place at the "dugout" and along the creek where Quincy and Moon are killed, as well as the scene where Rooster carries Mattie on her horse Little Blackie after the snakebite, were filmed at Hot Creek on the east side of the Sierra Nevada near the town of [[Mammoth Lakes, California]]. [[Mount Morrison (California)|Mount Morrison]] and [[Laurel Mountain (California)|Laurel Mountain]] form the backdrop above the creek. This location was also used in ''[[North to Alaska]]''.{{sfn|Shepherd|Slatzer|Grayson|2002|p=274}} Filming was done from September to December 1968.{{sfn|McGhee|1990|p=361}}

Veteran John Wayne stunt-double Tom Gosnell does the stunt in the meadow, where "Bo" goes down, on his longtime horse Twinkle Toes.<ref name=SRWF>{{cite news |title=Stuntman Recalls Wayne Friendship |newspaper=[[Kingman Daily Miner]] |agency=Associated Press |date=June 15, 1979 |page=A5 }}</ref> In the last scene, Mattie gives Rooster her father's gun. She comments that he has gotten a tall horse, as she expected he would. He notes that his new horse can jump a four-rail fence. Then she admonishes him, "You're too old and fat to be jumping horses." Rooster responds with a smile, saying, "Well, come see a fat old man sometime," and jumps his new horse over a four-rail fence. Although many of Wayne's stunts over the years were done by [[Chuck Hayward]] and [[Chuck Roberson]], it is Wayne on Twinkle Toes going over the fence.<ref name=SRWF/> This stunt had been left to the last shot as Wayne wanted to do it himself and following his lung surgery in 1965, neither Hathaway nor Wayne was sure he could make the jump. Darby's stunts were done by Polly Burson.<ref>{{cite news |last=De Witt |first=Barbara |title=How the West was won: fearless women on horseback |newspaper=[[Los Angeles Daily News]] |date=March 11, 1995 }}</ref>

The horse shown during the final scene of ''True Grit'' (before he jumps the fence on Twinkle Toes) was Dollor, a two-year-old (in 1969) chestnut Quarter Horse gelding. Dollor ('Ol Dollor) was Wayne's favorite horse for 10 years. Wayne fell in love with the horse, which carried him through several more Westerns, including his final movie, ''[[The Shootist]]''. Wayne had Dollor written into the script of ''The Shootist'' because of his love for the horse; it was a condition for him working on the project. Wayne would not let anyone else ride the horse, the lone exception being [[Robert Wagner]], who rode the horse in a segment of the ''[[Hart to Hart]]'' television show, after Wayne's death.<ref>{{cite news |last=Whiteside |first=John |date=January 19, 1985 |title=The Duke's Horse Keeps Special Bond |newspaper=[[Chicago Sun Times]] }}</ref>

[[Image:True-Grit.jpg|thumb|right|150px|[[John Wayne]] as [[Rooster Cogburn (character)|Rooster Cogburn]]]]By the time the picture got back to the studio interiors, Kim Darby told Hal Wallis she would never work for Hathaway again. John Wayne was another matter. "He was wonderful to work with, he really was", said Darby. "When you work with someone who's a big star as he is ... there's an unspoken thing that they sort of set the environment for the working conditions on the set and the feeling on the set. And he creates an environment that is very safe to work in. He's very supportive of the people around him and the people he works with, very supportive. He's really a reflection, an honest reflection, of what he really is. I mean that's what you see on the screen. He's simple and direct, and I love that in his work."{{sfn|Eyman|2014|p=447}} Surrounded by an angry director, a nervous actress, and the inexperienced Glen Campbell, Wayne took the reins between his teeth the same way Rooster Cogburn does in the climax of the film. "He was there on the set before anyone else and knew every line perfectly", said Kim Darby.{{sfn|Eyman|2014|p=445}} Both Wayne and Hathaway had difficulties with [[Robert Duvall]], with the director having constant shouting matches with his supporting actor, and Duvall and Wayne nearly coming to blows.

Hathaway says Campbell "was so damn lazy" and had troubles with Darby ("I had to stop her from acting funny".)<ref name="hen"/>

=== Rating ===
The film was initially given an M rating{{efn|Due to confusion over whether or not "M"-rated films were suitable for children, the M rating was renamed to GP in 1970 and then to PG in 1972.<ref>{{cite book |first=Peter |last=Krämer |title=The New Hollywood: From Bonnie and Clyde to Star Wars |year=2005 |series=Short Cuts Series |publisher=[[Columbia University Press]] |isbn=978-0-231-85005-6 |oclc=952779968|page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=29Y3BAAAQBAJ&pg=PA49 49]}}</ref>}} when it was submitted to the [[Motion Picture Association|Motion Picture Association of America]]'s rating board. The filmmakers subsequently edited "four-letter words" out of some scenes to accommodate a G rating.<ref>{{Cite web |title=True Grit |url=https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/moviedetails/23723 |access-date=2023-11-30 |website=[[American Film Institute]]}}</ref>