Movie Review: Crazy Heart

Based on last weekend's Grammy Awards, you might think a career in music is the height of glamour. The people are beautiful, the money big, the venues clean and well-lit. And for those fortunate few at the top, it is. But for most everyone else, the life of a professional musician is a lot more like the harsh reality depicted in "Crazy Heart" - a good movie that should still be better than it is.

"Crazy Heart" begins and ends with Jeff Bridges' Oscar-nominated star turn as Bad Blake, a past-his-prime country star. Blake is 57 going on 87, and he seems determined to burn his life down to the very last bridge in the name of holding onto whatever pride he has left.

As the film opens, Blake is getting by on long-ago hits he plays in thankless one-nighters in bars and bowling alleys. Pickup bands serve as his back-up, and he passes the nights with a series of pickup women.

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The best thing you can say about Blake is that he means no harm and inflicts more damage on himself than anyone else. Old-school enough to still use payphones and a battered gas-guzzler, Blake has only one possession he takes care of: his guitar, which is polished to a high-gloss sheen.

There is any number of real-life models for Blake, including Billy Joe Shaver and George Jones. But as I watched Blake spiral downhill, I was thinking of Texas troubadour Kinky Friedman's 1973 portrait of the downside of fame, "Sold American":

Faded jaded falling cowboy star

Pawnshop's itching for your old guitar

Where you're going, God only knows

The sequins have fallen from your clothes.

"Crazy Heart" is based on Thomas Cobb's 1987 novel, in which Blake continued more or less straight downhill. The movie version finds a note of redemption that is less grim but not entirely convincing - and here is where Bridges' performance, as good as it is, works at cross-purposes to the plot.

A character study

Bridges' portrayal of Blake's downward spiral is such that you just can't imagine him turning his life around quite this easily. He doesn't get the girl, but he does get his life together, an appealing scenario that doesn't quite ring true.

As a character study of a man battling demons and trying to reconnect with his muse, the film is quite spare; maybe too spare, especially regarding the other characters.

Blake's romance with Maggie Gyllenhaal (who also got an Oscar nod) doesn't add up (her attraction to him remains a mystery), and Colin Farrell conveys too much humility and not enough ego as Blake's onetime-sidekick-turned-star-frontman.

Nevertheless, Bridges' performance is a marvel. He has the beaten-down amble of a music lifer accustomed to disappointment down cold, stuffing three cigarettes into his mouth at a time. One of them will stay in, he figures, and sure enough one does. That's a batting average Blake has learned to settle for.

Also on the plus side is the T-Bone Burnett-produced soundtrack, featuring credible vocal performances by Bridges (whose voice might remind longtime Triangle barflies of Backsliders frontman Chip Robinson) and Farrell. Rising star Ryan Bingham lends further credibility with an onscreen cameo and a fine performance of the end-credits theme.

Maybe Bingham will have a kinder fate than Bad Blake.