20 Greatest Revenge Movies Of All-Time

13. True Grit

Based on the novel by Charles Portis, the most recent big screen take on True Grit comes courtesy of the Coen Brothers, who view this as a new adaptation rather than a remake. John Wayne appeared in a lesser version in 1969, of course, for which he won an Oscar. As you'd expect from a western directed by the pair who brought the world movies such as Blood Simple, Fargo and No Country For Old Men, it contains enough of their idiosyncratic quirks to keep fans happy. But it also might well be their most straight-laced movie of all - unironic in a way that their other plainly aren't.

Poised as a simple revenge tale in the western tradition, True Grit tells the story of a young girl called Mattie Ross who teams up with a drunk of a US Marshall (played unforgettably - and incoherently - by Jeff Bridges) in order to track down the man who murdered her father. Mattie is forthright and uncynical about her task, which she views as a necessary act of justice; she isn't the sort to get bogged down with emotions.

The film itself is - as all cinema lovers have come to expect from the Coen Brothers - tense, funny, and violent. It is also beautifully written, shot and directed.