Hey folks, Harry here... this is one that I missed a screening for yesterday - but will catch up with Thursday night. I'm a huge Johnny Cash fan, having seen him perform many times in this city of outlaw blues. Can't wait to check this one out. Here ya go...
Hi Harry,
I've been a loyal reader of the site for many years. Sent you a review years ago, and even though I've attended many screenings in the years inbetween, have avoided the talk-backers since then. However, thought I'd give it another try, as I haven't seen many reviews of "Walk the Line" on the site, and as I had the good fortune to sit in on a Q&A with James Mangold and Gil Dennis after the screening, I thought it was worth a mention.
To begin, I really didn't know much about Johnny Cash and June Carter before going in, except the interviews I read post-June's death, and pre-Johnny's in Entertainment Weekly, and any press the movie has recieved. I also have a rather unpleasant association with "Ring of Fire" as the result of a overly dramatic employer who thought it would be funny to fire someone with a soundtrack, but that's another story for another day.... So, going into the movie, I didn't know much of the story, except that it was another "Singer makes it big, gets involved with drugs, loses everything, kicks the habit, and is redeemed by love" bio-pic. And okay, it is that, but it's also a really moving story about (to quote Gil Dennis) "the most haunted man I've ever met" and the one person that could save him.
A quick summary of the story, with as few spoilers as possible. Johnny Cash was a man forever haunted by an emotionally abusive father, and a tragedy that shaped his childhood. He married a woman he barely knew, and made his first record as a result of a desperate need to pay the rent. All he ever really wanted was to play Gospel music, but he wasn't very good at it. So instead, he wrote songs about the harshness of life, and played it in a cool, rockabilly style, and the country loved it. As a child and young man, he listened to the voice of June Carter, and when they meet for the first time, on Johnny's first tour, his admiration turns to worship as he meets a true soulmate. From there, we follow Johnny and June's story, as she rejects him time and time again, and he turns to prescription pills for solace. It seems there's always a bit further for Johnny to fall, whether it's collapsing onstage during a sold-out performance in Vegas, o
It's a pretty straight forward story. During the Q&A, it was clear that both James Mangold and Gil Dennis had a great affection for Johnny and June Carter Cash. Every studio (they made a point of emphasizing the word "every"), major and indie, turned this picture down, and it only got tougher to sell after the passing of June and Johnny. Filming was finished before Ray was released, and no one believed this picture would sell. But it turns out, James Mangold is a hardcore Johnny Cash fan, and he fought to get the movie made, and to make it right. They don't whitewash Johnny's story. His mistakes are there in all their glory, and they continually described Johnny Cash as a vulnerable man constantly apologizing for the ways he had harmed people throughout his early career. If the story suffers, it's in the fact that to fully tell the story of June and Johnny, other details of his life get pushed to the background. Except for a fe
This is a love story, or as Mangold described "the story of a man searching for love", and Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon hold the movie together. I've never been a huge fan of either actor, but they really pulled out all the stops here. Right off the bat, they pull off the musical portions of the film incredibly well. Even though I knew going in that they were doing their own singing, I caught myself questioning several times whether I was listening to the actors themselves or a master recording. The musical numbers really drive the story, and had the actors not been able to pull off the singing as well as they did, the film really would have suffered. Clearly, Joaquin Phoenix had the more difficult job of imitating one of the more distinguishable voices in country music, and he really lives up to the challenge. But more than that, he inhabits the role, taking Cash from a naive struggling musician to a man who's earned the right to sin
I really enjoyed this movie. It's paced well, and stays interesting throughout. It's not "Ray", and there's no Jamie Foxx imitation for the media to go crazy over, so it's probably not going to get the reaction the "Ray" did. But this is a strong movie, and an enjoyable one, and like any good music bio-pic, makes you want to run-out and buy a Johnny Cash collection as soon as you leave the theater. Most importantly (and I'll preface this by saying that I'm an incurable romantic), this is a true story that leaves with the hope that true love really can conquer all, because it did for Johnny and June Carter Cash.
Call me Maidy.
