By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Scott Cooper
Starring: Beth Grant | Colin Farrell | Jeff Bridges | Maggie Gyllenhaal | Robert Duvall
Country: united_states
Year: 2009
Running time: 112
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1263670/
Jason says: “There are some fantastic scenes in CRAZY HEART. Pretty much any where you have Jeff Bridges and Robert Duvall together, for instance. Not much of great import happens during those, but you’ve got two great pros who seem to know their characters inside-out working off each other. Early scenes with Bridges and Maggie Gyllenhaal. The ones featuring an unbilled Colin Farrell as a country star who got his start with Bridges’s down-on-his-luck Bad Blake are excellent: There’s a great one where Farrell’s Tom Sweet comes on stage during Blake’s opening set that tells the pair’s whole history just by the way the camera shows them trying to crowd the microphone.
“Great stuff. And what is it leading up to? A kid getting lost in a mall, and then some sincere and utterly standard-issue twelve-step stuff as Bad Blake realizes he really, truly has a problem with alcohol and should seek help. Which is nice, and I don’t mean to diminish what an accomplishment getting sober is, but the fact that Bad Blake is a drunk is the least interesting thing about him. Yes, it’s likely the root of all his other issues, and I’m not saying that I liked him better when he drank, but for the first three quarters of the movie, Bad’s issues are fairly unique to him, and seeing that pushed aside for the ending of every story about alcoholism is kind of a letdown. 3 1/2 cats
“Seen 16 January 2010 at AMC Boston Common #15 (first-run)”