Damon and Brolin Saddle up for the Coens’ True Grit Remake

With Rooster Cogburn already cast (that role went to the Coens’ familiar muse Jeff Bridges), the brothers Coen are looking at Matt Damon as an idealistic lawman who accompanies Cogburn on his quest for vengeance, and their former “No Country for Old Men” good guy Josh Brolin to play the film’s bad guy, a role played by Jeff Corey in the original film. (With Robert Duvall and Dennis Hopper also playing villains in the movie.) Both A-list actors are currently in negotiations, but considering that people will shoot their own mothers to work with the Coens, it’s in all likelihood a done deal.

The only role left to be cast now is the 14-year old girl who seeks out drunken U.S. marshall Rooster Cogburn for aid in bringing in her father’s murderer. Since the girl is just as pivotal to the movie as Bridges’ Cogburn, it’s no wonder the brothers are taking their time casting her.

The Coens are producing the remake with powerhouses Scott Rudin and Steven Spielberg. Word is, the script that the Coens wrote is much more faithful to the original novel by Charles Portis. Marguerite Roberts adapted the screenplay for the 1969 original, which was directed by Henry Hathaway.

What? Me, a bad guy? Oh right, the gun and the blood. Nevermind.